A new high-speed Eurostar train link was opened with much fanfare this week, cutting travel times to Paris and Brussels from London by about 20 minutes.
It takes a shade over two hours to reach Paris and less than two hours to reach Brussels after 5.9 billion pounds was spent on the link on the British side of the Channel Tunnel and on refurbishment of St. Pancras station in London.
Train travel times within the UK, however, remain stubbornly slow. It can take about as long to get to Cardiff from London as it does the French capital and twice as long to reach Edinburgh.
It takes about two-and-half hours to reach Leeds and around four hours to get to Plymouth. And that’s without all the engineering works at the weekend.
Would it perhaps have been better to have spent all those millions on speeding up the rail network within the country rather than shaving a few minutes from a Continental route? Let us know your views.
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7 comments so far
Not to mention the cost, I regularly travel from London to Leeds and from London to Paris and often find I pay more for the Leeds train.
Eurostar has to factor into its prices the costs associated with digging the channel tunnel and the new £800m St Pancras project, but the East coast railway line has been around for 100 yrs - how can GNER justify such prices?
- Posted by GNEangRy£5.9 billion spread thinly across the network would achieve very little noticeable improvement. The real folly is that the government have cancelled work on the high speed line from St Pancras to the North which would have given the UK a world class inter-city system and allowed the railways to genuinely compete with air travel both inland and to the Continent. It is another demonstration of the government’s inability to extricate itself from the mire of failed dogma and build for the future.
- Posted by Mike TI was amazed to hear that the new high speed line was the first railway to be build in the UK for over 100 years. Crazy for a country that invented the railway. Here in Belgium I can chose between 4 different high speed train systems (Eurostar, Thalys, TGV and the German ICE) and the normal trains are a lot cheaper and faster than the UK ones as well. For now I’ll just go visit London, but when the domestic railroads improve I’ll visit the rest of the UK
- Posted by Cedric Van DorpeAgreed, UK rail travel, when compared to Deutsche Bahn or SCNF is rather slow. On the other hand, we have already privatised and do not have ongoing strikes for the foreseeable future.
It’s a huge job to build high speed rail for the entire country, and seeing as the British public bemoans paying rates of tax which are currently far lower than in either Germany or France, it is understandable why any UK government will not roll out a nationwide programme. You always pay for what you get. Also the increased fares in the UK are because we operate a airline style purchasing system; first come cheaper tickets. In Germany, flat fares apply. Lastly, the more expensive fares have improved the quality of service enormously since the few years before privatisation. Anyone want to go back to slam door trains and leaves on the line?
- Posted by News NerdThe Labour Party came to power promising a joined up transport policy and put John Prescot in charge. It’s no wonder we are in such a mess!
- Posted by WilliamI regularly FLY between London and Edinburgh, why?
1. Because it is cheaper
2. It is quicker
3. I am guaranteed a seat
Until the Railway Companies seriously invest and get the fundamentals right then they will be unable to compete with the airlines.
The Government of course has a key role in all this and needs to implement a serious transport policy (backed up by some serious investment for once)that actually focuses on assisting transportion of the masses (vital to our current economy) instead of trying enforce ‘our vision for the future’ upon us, which seems to revolve around letting the local authorties implement bufoon/inept attempts at traffic management in order to ‘coax’ us out of our cars. All I can say is: no viable alternative, no chance. Wait a minute is that a councillor driving to work in his car? Oh that’s right he’s far too important to leave his car at home, maybe he should’ve left himself at home and just let the traffic flow.
Oh and forget the Green Movement in this country, they should be concerning themselves with America and China instead of the UK’s 2% contribution to world emissions.
Transport rant over, I’ve got a flight to catch.
- Posted by JamesI am in Italy for a while, lots of trains may be a bit rough with no frills but the ticket prices are so cheap compared with the U.K., often not much more than the equivalent road toll charges.
- Posted by Jim WaughAlso the journey has a friendly feel about it, which is unusual in today’s travel industries.