According to the executive of the region, these lines represent a development potential today underutilized by the SNCF.
Le Monde with AFP
This is a first for cross-border lines. On Friday, December 17, the Grand-East region announced that it opened to the competition of the SNCF railway lines to Germany.
The market, which includes the resumption of SNCF staff, will be open to “any operator, French, German or other”, “said David Valencia, Vice President of Transport, at a press point.
Exploitation from December 2024
In detail, the Regional Council voted the commitment of the procedure for the exploitation of seven links representing a total of 525 kilometers from Metz (Moselle), Strasbourg (Bas-Rhin) and Mulhouse (high- Rhine) to the border German cities of Trier, Saarbrücken, Neustadt, Karlsruhe, Offenburg and Müllheim, located in the Länder of Rhineland-Palatinate, Saarland and Baden-Württemberg.
It plans to start the exploitation on December 8, 2024, after the notice of appeal to the competition it publishes at the end of this month in common with the three Länder, with a view to designating the winners MI-2023 . Lasting fifteen years, the market is divided into two lots, one at the start of Metz and one of the Alsace, for a volume of operation valued at 6.4 million trains-kilometers per year, both of which are Third-party in French territory.
Response to a “strong demand”
According to the executive of the region, these lines represent a development potential today underutilized by the SNCF. According to Mr Valence and Evelyne Isinger, regional councilor delegated to cross-border mobility, the opening will multiply the offer by two to four depending on the sections, in response to a “strong demand”, and it “will create it” on the lines Metz -Très and Strasbourg-Karlsruhe, “which will pass from zero train weekly to eight and seventeen round trips per day”.
The grand-is forms a basin of about 12 million inhabitants and 45,000 frontier workers with the territories of the three Länder which are bordering it.
The question of the technical compatibility of the rolling stock is “set in advance”, said Jean Rottner, President the Republicans of the Regional Council, thanks to the Order by the Region for 375 million euros of thirty trains Alstom that can circulate Indifferently on both French and German networks. According to Rottner, investments to modernize infrastructure will be indispensable. This point is not part of the market, but an agreement of 2020 between the French state and the Grand-East region sets the principles, “said Valence.
The grand-east had already opened up the competition of the internal lines in its territory, between Nancy (Meurthe-et-Moselle) and Contrexéville (Vosges) and between Strasbourg (Bas-Rhin), Saint-Die-des-Vosges and Epinal (Vosges). The results of the procedure, still in progress, are not yet known.