It was one of the weirder experiences of my #CrossBorderRail project last year. I had arrived in Belfort in eastern France from Besançon, and needed to get to Delémont in Switzerland. There is a line between the two, but Swiss trains mostly depart from the TGV station that is 10km […]
Switzerland
Border stations in national tariff systems – a simple change with a meaningful impact
At opposite ends of Germany there are two cross border railways where tickets for the trains are wonderfully simple – from Gronau (Nordrhein-Westfalen) to Enschede (Netherlands), and from Freilassing (Bayern) to Salzburg (Austria). At two other borders – Kehl (Baden-Württemberg) to Strasbourg (France), and Forst Lausitz (Brandenburg) to Żary (Poland) […]
The best #CrossBorderRail lines to visit
#CrossBorderRail is a very political project – to push for better international railway connections between European countries. But one of the things that makes the project so fun is that it has taken me to some wonderful places amongst the 130 borders I have crossed in the past 12 months […]
From the sublime to the slightly ridiculous: trip timetable changes in Switzerland and Romania
Max Wyss – one of the excellent community of Swiss railway nerds on Twitter – messaged me with a suggestion: why not route via Rapperswil to St Gallen on Day 23 of #CrossBorderRail. That would mean taking in part of the Voralpen Express run by Südostbahn. The new Stadler built trains […]
Days 13 and 14 replanned to enter Switzerland at Delle
I’ve made a small change to the route on Days 13 and 14. Instead of taking the train from Lyon to Genève in Switzerland on Day 13, I will instead stay in France – in Lons-le-Saunier. Then on Day 14 I will take regional trains via Besançon-Viotte and Belfort and […]
The next problem for night trains in Netherlands: the locomotives are too heavy (or the track too unstable)
We’ve previously examined the headaches finding rolling stock (i.e. carriages) for the new Zürich – Amsterdam NightJet that will run from December this year, but now another problem has come to light – the locomotives, and specifically that they are too heavy. We’ve been pointed towards this PDF issued by […]