Chartering Eurostar

[SELLCPN]

So a very long, and very far fetched idea that me and a couple of mates were coming up with the other day, wondered about the possibility of chartering a Eurostar train to take large numbers of people onto the continent and then back in a day.

Does anyone know if anything like this has ever been done before/would be feasible and if so where to start?

 

[Bletchleyite]

I'm sure you could, but the cost would be absolutely immense.

Nonetheless if you fancy spending that sort of money, I guess contacting Eurostar themselves would be the thing to do.

 

[SELLCPN]

Cheers Neil,

We want to approach Eurostar to see what they say regarding the idea, but want to put out a feeder first to see if anything has ever been done before, and then ascertain how pricing and quotes were matching up etc.

 

[ainsworth74]

I am not aware of Eurostar having run a charter service through the tunnel (or anywhere else for that matter) so I'm not sure you'll have anything to compare to! But if they do give you quote please do come back and let us know, it would be very interesting to hear what it is!

 

[heart-of-wessex]

UKRailtours chartered a Eurostar before for a Paris railtour, and I'm sure some other small charter company did the same thing as well so I guess they can run un-scheduled services at a price if you are willing to pay

 

[matt_world2004]

Hasnt there been mixed passenger/freight charters before through the Eurotunnel like the Kosovo train for life. I would imagine it would be pretty difficult and expensive to charter a eurostar train directly due to the loss of capacity through use of the rolling stock might cause, however a freight company with Eurotunnel route knowledge if they also run chartered passenger services might be able to. Especially if their charter can leave from a smaller station

 

[pdeaves]

however a freight company with Eurotunnel route knowledge if they also run chartered passenger services might be able to. Especially if their charter can leave from a smaller station

Fine, as long as the rolling stock is 'tunnel compatible' (that means you can't use a rake of West Coast mark 1s that would otherwise be lying around).

 

[deltic]

If you go to http://eurostar4agents.com/charter-trains you will see that you can charter a Eurostar train

 

[Phil.]

Several Eurostar sets have been run as charters. The year after the move to St. Pancreas one was charted by a religious organisation based in Liverpule to take about 400 people to the nearest station for Lourdes.
I won't weary you with the black jokes that were made on it's return following the number of wheelchair requests for it.
The film company responsible for the nearly two hours of crap that was "The DaVinci Code" hired a train to take them and the "stars" to Nice/Cannes - can't remember. Somewhere on the south coast. Just one crew change at Lille.
Then there was the late (circa 23.00) train that was hired for Paris for the cast of "Les Miserable".
If you've got the money they'll hire you a train - but it ain't cheap.

 

[theblackwatch]

UKRailtours chartered a Eurostar before for a Paris railtour, and I'm sure some other small charter company did the same thing as well so I guess they can run un-scheduled services at a price if you are willing to pay

I think you might find it was in the pre-UKR days, ie Hertfordshire Rail Tours, that a Eurostar was chartered. I think on several occasions, John Farrow ran a '3 Capitals' tour, from Waterloo to Brussels and Paris then back in a day.

 

[SpacePhoenix]

How many of the past charters of Eurostar would be viable if they were ever wanted to be repeated? Whilst the 373s are probably cleared for additional routes in France in addition to normal routes the 374s are probably only cleared for the normal routes

 

[edwin_m]

How many of the past charters of Eurostar would be viable if they were ever wanted to be repeated? Whilst the 373s are probably cleared for additional routes in France in addition to normal routes the 374s are probably only cleared for the normal routes

May even be the other way round - the 374 is a TSI-compliant Euro-train so should be able to travel quite widely without extra approvals. The French have probably found a reason though why it can't use their classic network except into Paris Nord.

 

[gsnedders]

May even be the other way round - the 374 is a TSI-compliant Euro-train so should be able to travel quite widely without extra approvals. The French have probably found a reason though why it can't use their classic network except into Paris Nord.

And Est, I'd assume, given the ICE 3M (I hope that's the right variant!) services off LGV Est?