France

“Summer 2025” for the new Régiolis trains France-Germany – Leroy and Hermann are just picking dates at random

So the new Régiolis trains are going to be running on France-Germany routes in “Summer 2025” according to Transport Minister, Baden-Württemberg Winfried Hermann and President of Région Grand Est, Franck Leroy. They may as well be picking dates at random. It is all because of delayed approval of the trains […]

Read More

Press coverage, interviews and presentations from #CrossBorderRail South East Europe 2024

At the somewhat dilapidated border station Šíd (Serbia, border to Croatia) I sat and talked with the freelance journalist Thomas Roser – he is based in Beograd. This resulted in 5 articles in the German speaking press – 4 in Germany, 1 in Austria. Frankfurter Rundschau Bahn in Europa: Letzter […]

Read More

30 trains costing €376 million for France-Germany services – parked up without any prospect of operations until 2027

Regional rail services between France and Germany are poor, but change is supposed to be around the corner. A fleet of new Régiolis trains for the these services has been ordered and built (and I set out to find them) but when the operations of these trains will start, and […]

Read More

Live Blog – #CrossBorderRail South East Europe Day -02 26 May 2024 – Ravières – Montbard – Paris – Köln – Hamburg – Travemünde, onto night ferry

Jump to: Text updates | Summary videos | Latest photos | Today’s background | Today’s route   The best way to follow #CrossBorderRail as the trip develops is on social mediaThere are always posts on Mastodon (@jon@gruene.social & #CrossBorderRail)   Today’s live text updates Text updates are auto-generated from Mastodon […]

Read More

Live Blog – #CrossBorderRail 2024 Extra Days 7 May – La Ciotat – Nice – Ventimiglia – Limone – Breil-sur-Roya – Nice – La Ciotat

Jump to: Text updates | Summary videos | Latest photos | Today’s background | Today’s route   The best way to follow #CrossBorderRail as the trip develops is on social mediaThere are always posts on Mastodon (@jon@gruene.social & #CrossBorderRail)   Today’s live text updates Text updates are auto-generated from Mastodon […]

Read More

Another #CrossBorderRail success – timetables for Irun-Hendaia Euskotren are finally in international timetable searches

A key message in all of my #CrossBorderRail work has been that some problems ought to be really easy to solve. The really, really, really easy ones ought to be the places where trains run, and even run with decent timetables, but there are data sharing problems – meaning the […]

Read More

Live Blog – #CrossBorderRail 2024 Extra Days 26 April – Valenciennes – Quiévrain – Gussignies – Aulnoye-Aymeries – Paris – Nuits-sous-Ravières

Jump to: Text updates | Summary videos | Latest photos | Today’s background | Today’s route   The best way to follow #CrossBorderRail as the trip develops is on social mediaThere are always posts on Mastodon (@jon@gruene.social & #CrossBorderRail)   Today’s live text updates This day of live coverage is […]

Read More

Back to Valenciennes, back to where #CrossBorderRail began – for the event to mark 20 years of the EU Agency for Railways

On 14 June 2022, on a crisp summer morning, I was the only passenger on an international train from Mons to Aulnoye-Aymeries, and would go on from there to the EU Agency for Railways in Valenciennes – the official start of the #CrossBorderRail project. Josef Doppelbauer, the boss of the […]

Read More