Sleepers Uncoupled
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SLEEPERS UNCOUPLED CASE STUDIES REPORT 20 FEBRUARY 2012 Photographs courtesy of Mark Smith of Seat61.com www.seat61.com 1 Introduction developments in overnight and sleeper service updated from other sources. This shows all Background across continental Europe. services with sleeping accommodation (except JMP has been appointed by HITRANS to for those provided solely as part of a car- undertake a review of the operational This Document carrying train, and therefore not accessible to characteristics of European sleeper services to Following the study Inception Meeting on 12th foot passengers), but does not show overnight help inform their submission to Transport January 2012 the first task in the programme trains made up of day carriages only. Scotland’s Rail 2014 Consultation document. developed by JMP has been to prepare a Our definition of mainland Europe is the area tabulation of current sleeper services operating The requirements of the study were set out covered by Central European Time (i.e. 1 hour across Europe in order to classify them by clearly in the brief. In summary it is to ahead of UK time) and all trains either operational type and characteristic and identify investigate the provision of rail overnight and originating or arriving in this time zone are appropriate service types for more detailed sleeping car services across Europe by included, plus internal services in Finland. review in a series of case studies. studying a wide range of operations both internal and cross-border and to categorise This document is accompanied by an Excel Notes on Appendix 1 Table them by, amongst other factors; spreadsheet which contains full details of the Where multiple entries occur, the first refers to services. The selected case studies follow this the Between-And direction, the second to the Ownership, financial and operator introduction and they are accompanied by a And-Between direction. characteristics; separate report on recent trends in the Rolling stock and operational Ref European rail sleeper market. characteristics; The first column is merely for sorting the table Track and station access arrangements Introduction to Table of European into an order (which roughly corresponds to and charges; Sleeper Services the order in which they appear in the Thomas Service characteristics – facilities, service Cook timetable). patterns, seasonality etc; There are more than 150 pairs of sleeper Characteristics Customer interface – ticketing, booking trains operating in mainland Europe, with more arrangements etc; than half of these making international We have determined the characteristics of Integration with other modes and security journeys. each train in the accompanying table by the /border crossing arrangements. In the following table at Appendix 1, we have following method: The above is to be couched within an overview taken basic details from the Thomas Cook B uses branch/secondary line for part of of current trends and an assessment of future December 2011 timetable, augmented and journey NEA7015 Sleepers Uncoupled – Case Study Introduction 3 H train with hotel standard accommodation Spanish and Balkan train services, and the restaurant to nothing, and may not be available (though may convey other types too) Trondheim-Bodo service in Norway. over the whole route. Not all timetables give this information. P portion working Daytime Options O Open access operation Where there are obvious alternatives, the Notes S seasonal service typical journey time and the number of These show where trains are combined or W weekend service services per day is quoted. “Ch” means a detached from others. Information is always All other trains are city to city. change is necessary; occasionally, two given in the Between-And direction, though the Train Name/Number changes. majority also apply, suitably reversed, in the opposite direction. On international services, the train number Train facilities may vary between countries. Generally the We have divided these into hotel standard, 1st Any other information, such as travel numbers shown are for the originating country. and 2nd class sleepers, couchettes and day restrictions, is also recorded here. Recent The second number is the train in the reverse carriages. Y means that both 1st and 2nd class information suggests a number of trains in Italy direction (ie from And to Between). are provided, either 1 or 2 indicates only one and the Balkans do not convey the advertised Occasionally multiple numbers are allocated, class is available. Note however that the sleeping accommodation. which may be used on different days of the accommodation described with standard terms Country Codes week. varies from country to country (and more detail The remaining columns show the countries will be provided with the main report). Journey Time served by international trains. Except where Figures quoted have been rounded up to the We have generally assumed hotel standard to shown against the relevant train, there is only nearest 15 minutes, though these can vary by include a private shower and WC. First class one infrastructure owner in each country (e.g. direction. Where the difference exceeds 30 increasingly includes a WC, but may just for train ref 36, when this is extended to Brig, it minutes, a second figure appears for the indicate a more spacious compartment. travels over the BLS network, in addition to reverse direction. Couchettes generally have six berths, though SBB tracks). some have only four. These are almost With very few exceptions, sleeper services are Sheet Two – InfraCo – gives a key to the ISO universally second class only, except notably slower than their daytime equivalents. In some country codes, and the name of the in France where four berth couchettes are cases, this is to ensure that departure and infrastructure owner. regarded as first class. Day carriages may be arrival are at appropriate times in the evening standard rolling stock, though some operators and morning, though the heavier weight of A note about City Night Line offer an improved standard with reclining seats sleeping cars will reduce locomotive The dominant brand in mainland Europe is City (see City Night Line brochure). performance on some routes. Night Line. The German-based network of We have omitted any reference to catering The vast majority are electrically-hauled, with night services is extensive and complicated, by facilities, as these vary enormously, from full diesel operation principally confined to some virtue of reforming many trains en route, to NEA7015 Sleepers Uncoupled – Case Study Introduction 4 provide through carriages between many The brochure also illustrates typical rolling impact of shorter journey times on high speed cities. We have also attached an English stock, includes diagrams of different types of lines has been a significant factor. language version of the brochure issued by DB berths, and indicative fares for some journeys. European railways have also tended to (though other train operators participate). improve utilisation of their rolling stock, and the Broadly speaking a glance at the map SNCF – Intercite de Nuit number of trains in the table shown as summer (reproduced here) reveals a number of routes By contrast, the network of SNCF sleepers for only is an indication of how poor was the use that run parallel over certain sections, and mainly internal travel in France continues to of some carriages. In theory, couchette most often this will be achieved by combining shrink. Newly rebranded this month from Corail carriages could be used as day carriages, trains from different origins and destinations. Lunéa to Intercité de Nuit, the map below though their different livery and branding rather shows how sparse this network now is. highlighted their intended purpose. Not shown in this table are the overnight motorrail services which no longer run for domestic journeys in France at all. In particular, the opening of the channel tunnel with its shorter journey times reduced the demand from British motorists arriving by ferry in northern France. The table overleaf illustrates this decline, Reproduced from DB Rail brochure showing overnight services using sleepers or The individual timetables confirm where times couchettes for journeys within France in 1992, are the same. for comparison with the current network. The reasons for decline are mixed, though the NEA7015 Sleepers Uncoupled – Case Study Introduction 5 Table 1.1 SNCF Sleeper Services in 1992 Trains for further study the journey will be completed on the main line network. An interesting comparison is the Paris With sleeper Couchette only In order to provide a useful – Toulouse - La Tour de Carol route in France, Tourcoing- Summer 2 Tourcoing-Lourdes Summer 2 representation of the range of which completes its journey on a 150 km Nice days/wk days/wk operational issues and variations in single track branch into the Pyrenees – Case Paris-Brest Daily Tourcoing-Port Bou Summer 2 operational arrangements that exist Study 3. days/wk across Europe we propose the following Nantes- Couchette Lyon-Brest case studies to represent the key service Open Access Operation Ventimiglia only during summer characteristics. In all cases, open access operation is by Paris-Tarbes/ Toulouse-Quimper In summer also Portion working Veolia. Of these, the Berlin-Malmo service has Hendaye conveys only recently been taken over from its previous sleepers As noted above, the City Night Line providers, while Veolia has replaced SNCF as Nantes-Nice Paris-Quiberon network employs extensive portion the French partner in the Paris – Rome Thello Hendaye- Paris-Bordeaux working, and is probably the best Ventimiglia service. example to study. Further, trains may be Calais-Port Summer 2 Paris-Madrid The longest established route is Storlien – Bou days/wk made up of rolling stock from more than Malmo, which competes with services provided Frankfurt-Port Paris-Hendaye Summer 1 one operator. We have looked at one of Bou day/wk the workings through Germany, the by state-owned SJ. We have selected this as Paris-Nice Paris-Lisbon Copenhagen-Prague, Amsterdam- Case Study 4.