Trivial pondering - overnight journeys from London

[Wilts Wanderer]

Hi folks

Bit of a random musing here. Imagine a Europe in the early 2000s whereby the EU did not deregulate short-haul air travel and therefore rail networks remained the dominant public transport choice for long distance intercity journeys. If Nightstar had gone ahead there would have been overnight services from various regions of the U.K. to France and Belgium, and presumably at some point Amsterdam and possibly Cologne. However I don’t ever recall seeing proposals for night trains starting from London, which could presumably have reached further into Europe than the Nightstar ever proposed to.

On that basis, purely for idle entertainment value, where do we think services starting from London could have reached? Travelling from London Victoria and then accessing HS1 via Fawkham Jn would give a journey to the Channel in a little over an hour, then 30 mins transit time and you’re onto the French classic network. So with (say) a 2000hrs departure and the +1hr time zone change, would any of the following be realistically reached:
- Marseille
- Stuttgart (or even Munich?)
- Turin (or even Milan?)

I’m guessing Venice would be out of reach and especially Vienna (given the NightJet just about manages to achieve sensible dep/arr times with a Brussels origin point!)

I miss the Eurocity overnight network. Paris GDL to Roma Termini on the 19:15 ‘Palatino’, those were the days…

 

[signed]

Barcelona would be easy to do. The Paris to Cerbère sleeper takes 12h with like a 1 to 2h tech stop in Toulouse

 

[Wilts Wanderer]

On the basis Calais-Paris via the classic Amiens route takes about 3hrs, presumably there is a route around/across Paris to access the main line to Perpignan, you’d be looking at 16h+ if you were lucky?

 

[signed]

On the basis Calais-Paris via the classic Amiens route takes about 3hrs, presumably there is a route around/across Paris to access the main line to Perpignan, you’d be looking at 16h+ if you were lucky?

I was mostly thinking about a sleeper that could run on LGV, because if Nightstar were a thing and short haul deregulation , I am pretty sure High-Speed sleepers (a la China) would have ended up being built.

Using HS1 LGV Nord, LGV Inter-Connexion and LGV Atlantique you could probably be in Toulouse in 6 to 7 hours. 12 to 14h maybe on that side

Or if you take the LGV Sud-Est then you could do that whole trip in like 11-12h (a TGV does Paris-Barcelona in a bit less than 7 hours)

 

[nwales58]

TL;DR; Conclusion: non-tunnel couchette services would have taken most of the rail growth.

Firstly, airline deregulation in Europe goes back further than that. From memory, we and the dutch had a forerunner bilateral in the early 80s and the EC first legislated in 1987, overriding existing bilaterals. 1992 legislation removed economic regulation after which you know the consequences.

Without that process, through rail would not have had the market to itself.

1) More bilaterals between like-minded member states would have happened. Seeing the money KLM was making out of hubbing UK traffic, at least one of AF or LH would have wanted a share too.

2) Everything finds ways to bypass restrictions. IT (inclusive tour) tickets and flights were growing rapidly, the accommodation requirement was widely bypassed. Those of us who travelled in the 80s used flight-only fares on the IT routes to mainland cities, a fraction of the real airline price and you received an accommodation voucher for a non-existent dormitory on an industrial estate.

3) Continental coach tours were growing rapidly too and some would probably have become 'tours' in name only as with flights for routes where the economics worked well. Coaches dominated London-Dublin before Ryanair killed them.

So on rail:

Nightstar+ would only have had to compete somewhere between the state airlines and these cheaper options so probably would have stuck to high yield routes. Fixed tunnel costs per train mean day trains would have been much cheaper per passenger than sleepers through the tunnel.

Remember we were all a lot poorer then. I only used Eurostar for work in the 1990s, i.e. someone else was paying. So cheaper options would have won in the absence of EasyRyan and the like.

My guess is that the traditional couchette trains to everywhere from Boulogne, Ostend etc would have carried on as long as foot ferry routes provided a cheap option. If day tunnel services had been sufficiently cheap the couchette trains would have truncated at Lille (possibly), more likely Paris and Brussels where the UK traffic would be using the same services as the locals.

In the late 70s and 80s I could get to within 100-200 miles of anywhere in Europe in a through coach on those couchette trains.

 

[Wilts Wanderer]

Firstly, airline deregulation in Europe goes back further than that. From memory, we and the dutch had a forerunner bilateral in the early 80s and the EC first legislated in 1987, overriding existing bilaterals. 1992 legislation removed economic regulation after which you know the consequences.

Without that process, through rail would not have had the market to itself.

1) More bilaterals between like-minded member states would have happened. Seeing the money KLM was making out of hubbing UK traffic, at least one of AF or LH would have wanted a share too.

2) Everything finds ways to bypass restrictions. IT (inclusive tour) tickets and flights were growing rapidly, the accommodation requirement was widely bypassed. Those of us who travelled in the 80s used flight-only fares on the IT routes to mainland cities, a fraction of the real airline price and you received an accommodation voucher for a non-existent dormitory on an industrial estate.

3) Continental coach tours were growing rapidly too and some would probably have become 'tours' in name only as with flights for routes where the economics worked well. Coaches dominated London-Dublin before Ryanair killed them.

So on rail:

Nightstar+ would only have had to compete somewhere between the state airlines and these cheaper options so probably would have stuck to high yield routes. Fixed tunnel costs per train mean day trains would have been much cheaper per passenger than sleepers through the tunnel.

Remember we were all a lot poorer then. I only used Eurostar for work in the 1990s, i.e. someone else was paying. So cheaper options would have won in the absence of EasyRyan and the like.

My guess is that the traditional couchette trains to everywhere from Boulogne, Ostend etc would have carried on as long as foot ferry routes provided a cheap option. If day tunnel services had been sufficiently cheap the couchette trains would have truncated at Lille (possibly), more likely Paris and Brussels where the UK traffic would be using the same services as the locals.

In the late 70s and 80s I could get to within 100-200 miles of anywhere in Europe in a through coach on those couchette trains.

Conclusion: non-tunnel couchette services would have taken most of the rail growth.

Thats a really interesting observation - I’m not old enough to remember much pre-Channel Tunnel (born 1986) but I do recall reading of the significance of trains starting from Boulogne etc. The tunnel charges are a reasonable point, but (for example) if the UK had remained aligned with the Maastricht Treaty, the funding for cross-Channel train services might possibly have been at least jointly funded by the EU?

I’m more interested in the operational and timetabling question to be honest, I realise in reality these kind of services were not viable financially. (Although this could be said of many overnight rail services, without subsidy.)

 

[Bald Rick]

Bit of a random musing here. Imagine a Europe in the early 2000s whereby the EU did not deregulate short-haul air travel and therefore rail networks remained the dominant public transport choice for long distance intercity journeys. If Nightstar had gone ahead there would have been overnight services from various regions of the U.K. to France and Belgium, and presumably at some point Amsterdam and possibly Cologne. However I don’t ever recall seeing proposals for night trains starting from London, which could presumably have reached further into Europe than the Nightstar ever proposed to.

Two things to add to what others have said.

1) rail ceased to be the dominant public transport choice for long distance intercity journeys to/from the UK long before before european airline deregulation.

2) the Nightstar proposals were for regional services from Swansea, Plymouth and Glasgow (via Birmingham and at one point Manchester) to Paris / Brussels (essentially portion working this side, and one train to each destination that side), and London services to Amsterdam/Köln and Dortmund/Frankfurt. They would all have been on classic lines both sides of the channel.

I was mostly thinking about a sleeper that could run on LGV

The french have always been very clear that the LGVs are not for opening overnight

 

[peteb]

A journey to Cote D'Azur combining LGV, tunnel and "normal" lines would be interesting. Assume only allowed on LGV including HS1 during daytime operating hours (i.e. not overnight in France) & limited to 125mph: St. Pancras to Calais Frethun 1.5 hrs; Paris avoider 4.5hrs; Lyon 9hrs; Marseille 11.5 hrs; Nice 13.5 hrs. So a 7pm departure from London gives a 9.30am arrival in Nice. But if allowed on the LGV south of Lyon then about an hour could be shaved off the Marseille time. Utilising the LGV at 125mph is feasible between Avignon area and Montpelier, so giving potential journey time of 14hrs to Perpignan (9am arrival). For onward TGV to Barcelona.......

 

[A S Leib]

Brussels – Hamburg leaving at 19:25 takes 11:17, including a wait of 1:58 at Köln and 2:00 at Hannover, so I think London – Hamburg at least would be doable. I think Kiel and Schleswig might have been doable in this scenario, but not necessarily with enough demand, especially as Copenhagen's close to five hours past Hamburg.

I think Lille – Strasbourg can be done in under seven hours on classic lines via Brussels, Arlon and Luxembourg City (and I can see a route via Sedan, but I don't know if that's used for passenger services), so maybe Mannheim or Stuttgart?

Based on the European Sleeper being an hour and a half slower than daytime trains between Bad Bentheim and Berlin, I'd guess that eight hours for Brussels – Leipzig via Frankfurt and Erfurt would be doable. Assuming four hours (being generous?) for Victoria to Midi / Zuid, that means getting to Leipzig by 09:00 and Dresden at ~10:00.

 

[StephenHunter]

Would Berlin be doable?

 

[signed]

Would Berlin be doable?

Probably not, current Nightjet timing between Brussels and Berlin sit at roughly 12h30, add like 3 to 4h to end up in Brussels

So you would need to leave at 6pm GMT from London to arrive at like 11am (which makes absolutely no sense for a sleeper)

 

[Bald Rick]

Would Berlin be doable?

Its doable by day train in 9hrs, if you are prepared to risk ~20 minute connections at each of Brussels and Köln.

But that is on Eurostars and ICEs, most if not all of which is at high speed on high speed lines.

Assuming a more sedate journey on classic lines, and more stops for traffic and resource changes, I reckon it would be getting on for 14 hours. That means a London departure around 1900 for a Berlin arrival around 0900 the next day.


In other news my sister has just cleared immigration at Berlin airport, having arrived at the airport this end at around 1800. It‘s cost her £90 return. You can see the challenge in capturing market share…

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 18 Sep 2024 ==

Probably not, current Nightjet timing between Brussels and Berlin sit at roughly 12h30, add like 3 to 4h to end up in Brussels

That NJ goes a long way round, from Köln down to Frankfurt / Mannheim then back up via Erfurt. Brussels to Berlin drect via Hannover would be much quicker. But still around 14h, as above.