A proposal for intra-schengen travel on Eurostar

[Trainbike46]

A potential way for Eurostar to improve certain connections, as well as increasing eurostar revenue, would be for eurostar to start selling tickets for journeys that don't start in the UK, but only where that seat has already been sold for a journey through the tunnel.

For example, if a ticket gets sold for London-Lille, then the same seat will become available for sale on Lille-Brussel or Lille-Netherlands.
Or if a London-Brussels ticket gets sold, then that seat becomes available for Brussels-Rotterdam/Amsterdam ticket sales.

In this way, Eurostar can sell tickets for connections within the EU, without risking intra-schengen passengers taking seats away from UK-continent passengers.

This would improve the connection between Lille and the Netherlands in particular, as there is currently no direct services at all.

It could also help the financial case for eurostar services to destinations further afield, as it adds an extra income stream to the long-distance trains in particular

Because of tunnel and border restrictions, this would only apply on trains from london to the continent, not the other way around.

 

[HamworthyGoods]

A potential way for Eurostar to improve certain connections, as well as increasing eurostar revenue, would be for eurostar to start selling tickets for journeys that don't start in the UK, but only where that seat has already been sold for a journey through the tunnel.

For example, if a ticket gets sold for London-Lille, then the same seat will become available for sale on Lille-Brussel or Lille-Netherlands.
Or if a London-Brussels ticket gets sold, then that seat becomes available for Brussels-Rotterdam/Amsterdam ticket sales.

In this way, Eurostar can sell tickets for connections within the EU, without risking intra-schengen passengers taking seats away from UK-continent passengers.

This would improve the connection between Lille and the Netherlands in particular, as there is currently no direct services at all.

It could also help the financial case for eurostar services to destinations further afield, as it adds an extra income stream to the long-distance trains in particular

Because of tunnel and border restrictions, this would only apply on trains from london to the continent, not the other way around.

Eurostar already sells seats from Lille to/from Brussels and has done since it started up.

 

[Trainbike46]

Eurostar already sells seats from Lille to/from Brussels and has done since it started up.

I knew they used to, I've seen people board in Lille when heading to Brussels, but since COVID I've not seen it happen anymore, so I thought they'd stopped.

Do you know if they offer Lille-Rotterdam/Amsterdam and Brussel-Rotterdam/Amsterdam tickets? If not, that would be an opportunity to expand

I did do an attempt to get a website to offer tickets direct Lille-Amsterdam using the eurostar, but that was unsuccesful

 

[RT4038]

I suspect that selling tickets in one direction, but not back again, would be more trouble than it is worth for such a niche market. Hence why they have stopped doing this, as it was done before.

 

[zwk500]

A potential way for Eurostar to improve certain connections, as well as increasing eurostar revenue, would be for eurostar to start selling tickets for journeys that don't start in the UK, but only where that seat has already been sold for a journey through the tunnel.

For example, if a ticket gets sold for London-Lille, then the same seat will become available for sale on Lille-Brussel or Lille-Netherlands.
Or if a London-Brussels ticket gets sold, then that seat becomes available for Brussels-Rotterdam/Amsterdam ticket sales.

Managing this within the sales system will be tricky, as it depends on people then not moving their bookings at a later point or whatever.

This would improve the connection between Lille and the Netherlands in particular, as there is currently no direct services at all.

Because there is tiny demand. The demand that is there is catered for by a change in Brussels.

It could also help the financial case for eurostar services to destinations further afield, as it adds an extra income stream to the long-distance trains in particular

I would be quite surprised if this managed to get above being revenue neutral. The only significant market is commuters from Lille to Brussels who then caused on end of issues with the return leg as the Belgians insisted they didn't go through security while the Home Office insisted on the security cordon being maintained on the train.

Eurostar currently serves destination with sufficient demand to fill their trains on a point-to-point basis, it doesn't need churn. Better option is to invest in the boarding facilities so that they can sell full trains from Origin. Then they can make extra money off the passengers with upgrades/food and drink.

If you want intra-schengen travel on Eurostar, there is a rather simple solution available. However it is rather unlikely to happen for domestic UK political reasons!

 

[Halish Railway]

I think the real solution to intra-Schengen travel is for the various national carriers to get their act together and provide more cross-border services.

I think extending the Benelux trains to Lille Europe once the ICNGs are delivered, the frequency is doubled and the service is adjusted to skip Breda, Noorderkempen and Brussels Airport N.B. would be a good idea given the turn up and go nature of the service, rather than a Eurostar train that can sell out weeks in advance. Although the caveat to this is the lack of TVM 430 compatibility with the ICNGs.

N.B. The aforementioned stations will be served by a new Eindhoven to Brussels service. This to be fair, is an example of bordering countries working together to deliver decent cross-border connections.

 

[zwk500]

I think the real solution to intra-Schengen travel is for the various national carriers to get their act together and provide more cross-border services.

I think extending the Benelux trains to Lille Europe once the ICNGs are delivered, the frequency is doubled and the service is adjusted to skip Breda, Noorderkempen and Brussels Airport N.B. would be a good idea given the turn up and go nature of the service, rather than a Eurostar train that can sell out weeks in advance. Although the caveat to this is the lack of TVM 430 compatibility with the ICNGs.

N.B. The aforementioned stations will be served by a new Eindhoven to Brussels service. This to be fair, is an example of bordering countries working together to deliver decent cross-border connections.

There are lots of very smooth cross-border journeys. Things get complicated when operating across 3 countries due to the extra rulebooks/language requirements (although NL-BE-FR is better off in this regard as it's Dutch/Flemish and French) and the technical compatibility (again this route is marginally easier because of the standardisation for 25KV on HSL/SNCF and the marginally simpler work for 1.5kv/3kv compatibility).

However with TGV and Intercity connections between Lille Europe and Brussels or Antwerp, is there really serious value in extending the ICNGs when Lille itself isn't really a destination, and most changes made there are easier to make in Brussels or a better frequency in Paris?