The TGV (Train à Grande Vitesse¹) is France's high-speed rail network, operated by the SNCF². The TGV design enables safe rail-travel at speeds of over 300 km/hour (186 mph). Three major routes set out from Paris; north to Lille-Calais, south-west towards Nantes and Bordeaux and south-east to Lyon and on down to Marseille. As it is electrically-powered, The TGV is arguably less harmful to the environment than conventional trains, although since the electricity is largely produced at nuclear power plants, there is some room for debate on this point. The service has been consistently popular with passengers, despite being slightly more expensive than traditional rail services. It is fast, efficient, comfortable and quiet. What more can you ask from a rail service?

A table of journey times to various destinations can be found at the bottom of this entry.

The fast track to success

It is important to note that the TGV is not simply a very fast train. Yes, the trains are very fast, but they can only achieve those speeds safely when running on specially designed track. The existing track has to be replaced and the new track is known as an LGV (Ligne à Grande Vitesse). Although the design does allow the TGV trains to use existing track, the new trains cannot travel at full speed on the old tracks. Of course, old trains can use the new LGVs. While not all main-line tracks have been completely relaid as LGVs, some have been 'improved' to enable higher speeds (around 200-220 km/h) without the cost of completely relaying the track.

Shortly before the first section (Paris-Lyon) opened to the public, one of the new trains registered a speed of 380 km/h (236 mph), setting a new world speed record ³ The service opened to the public as a record-breaking super-train and reached 10 million passengers in its first 10 months. Since then the TGV has continued to set the standard for the past 20 years. The distinctive streamlined trains were an instant hit with customers, becoming something of a national treasure as well as an international commercial success. The network now carries [ACCURATE PASSENGER FIGURES STILL WELCOMED] passengers every year at average speeds of around 300 km/h (186 mph).

Development

During the 1960s there had been various studies of new high-speed train concepts, many attempting to move away from the classic 'wheel-on-rail' design, considered restrictive at the time. In Japan, the Shinkansen (or 'Bullet') high speed train went into service, making the 338km trip between Tokyo and Osaka in just 1h20, an average speed of 253km/h. The SNCF were looking at ways to increase the speeds of their conventional rolling stock and in 1967 became involved in a collaborative research project with various other players in the industry. By the early 1970s Alsthom-Atlantique had produced a prototype high-speed train for test purposes.

The TGV 001 Turbotrain was powered by gas turbines and was used in over 5000 test runs covering almost half a million kilometres. It exceeded 300 km/h (186 mph) on 175 runs and reached a top speed of 318 km/h (198 mph) on 08 December 1972. This was (and remains) the world speed record for a non-electric train.

In the face of the 1974 Oil Crisis the designers to reconsider the possibilities of electric power and an electrically-powered train named Zébulon⁴ was developed in April of that year.

The chief designer on the project and the man behind the TGV's distinctive and renowned streamlined nose was Jack Cooper. He began working on the design for the TGV 001 turbotrain, inside and out, soon after joining Alsthom in 1968 and his visually impressive, futuristic design was adopted with little hesitation. The design phase for the TGV was complete by the mid 1970s and the first production order was placed on 4 November 1976.

The Network

There are three trunk lines leading out from Paris. The first line to open to the public was the TGV Sud-Est, on 27 September 1981, running south-east and linking Paris to Lyon. It was an instant success and domestic flights between the two cities dropped dramatically as passengers adopted the new train. It is interesting to note that the TGV became one of the few SNCF ⁵ services to operate at a profit, paying for the construction costs in just ten years. This unmitigated success convinced the French government to invest in the high-speed rail network and many more miles have now been added.

In 1989 the new TGV Atlantique line south-west went live, carrying passengers to destinations southwest of Paris. Half way to Nantes the track forks into two; one line continuing on to Nantes while the other turns south and terminates in Bordeaux. The TGV Atlantique is incomplete, however, and neither the Nantes nor the Bordeaux branches are exclusively TGV track. The trains slow down to 200-220 km/h when they reach the conventional (though slightly adapted) track.

The TGV Nord-Europe was opened in 1993 and goes due north as far as Lille before turning north-west to go through the Channel Tunnel and on to London via the Eurostar Channel Tunnel service. Trains also go on from Lille to destinations all over Belgium, The Netherlands and northern Germany. The high-speed rail service between Paris and Brussels is called Thalys, linking the French capital to the hub of Europe in 1h30. You can almost see those Eurocrats popping down to Paris for an all-expenses working lunch!

The Eurostar service is operated with TGV trains but the track on the UK side of the tunnel is not LGV-compatible. Work is currently underway (due to be completed 2003) on the new high-speed track running for 108km (68 miles) between the tunnel entrance and St Pancras Station - London⁶. This will reduce the UK leg of the journey by almost half. While travelling through the Channel Tunnel the trains will slow down to about 100 mph (168km/h) before accelerating back up to TGV speed on the other side. This should bring the overall city-centre to city-centre journey time down to about 2.5 hours.

Although a relatively minor addition to the network in terms of length, the Jonction Est, opened in 1994, crucially enables trains to bypass Paris to the east. This means passengers can avoid changing trains (and inevitably crossing Paris in the process), considerably reducing journey times from the north of France to the south-east.

On June 10th, 2001, President Jacques Chirac proudly opened the TGV Méditerranée, inaugurating the line that now links the Channel to the Mediterranean Sea. The TGV Méditerranée is effectively the last stage of the original TGV Sud-Est, taking passengers on down the Rhone valley to Marseille. Lille in the north to Marseille in the south in an incredible 4h30! That's a distance of 1,000 kilometres (621.4 miles) at an average speed of 317 kph (197 mph).

Quite an improvement on the days of the nineteenth century horse-drawn diligence coaches that would take about ten days to make the same journey. It also means that a London-Marseille direct service may soon be available, probably taking about 6h30. This may sound like a long time, but the trains are comfortable, the journey is smooth and in most cases passengers depart from and arrive in the respective city centres. Although TGV tickets are more expensive than conventional services, the price will probably be good value, especially for families booking well in advance.

Speed Records

In 1981, the new trains and track were used in a bid to achieve the world speed record, code-named operation TGV 100. The objective was to achieve a speed of 100 metres per second, or 360 km/h) and that target was exceeded on 26 February 1981, when trainset 16 reached a speed of 380 km/h (236 mph) in perfect safety.

Between November 1989 and May 1990 the SNCF carried out a series of high speed tests, pushing the TGVs to over 500 km/h. On May 18th, 1990, the last scheduled day of testing, the TGV Atlantique hit a top speed of 515.3 km/h (320.3 mph), setting a new world speed record once again.

On May 26th, 2001 TGV-Reseau set 531 achieved a new world endurance record on the journey from between Calais and Marseilles, completed in just 3h29! In the course of this 1067 km journey a new official world speed record for a non-stop run over 1000km by a conventional train was set at 3 hrs 9 mins (average speed 317.5 km/h)

Future developments

The TGV Est is due to open in 2006, though construction has barely begun at the time of writing. The new track will reduce the journey time between Paris and Strasbourg from 4.5 hours to 2hours 20mins. It will also probably link up with Germany's high-speed rail routes to continue the development of a truly Europe-wide network.

There are plans to develop two other new LGVs, LGV Aquitaine and LGV Rhin-Rhone. Don't hold your breath though! Both are "under study" but are not likely to be built before 2007. There is always a prolonged period of bargaining/squabbling over where tracks should be laid and trains should stop. Politics and industry take a long time to come to an agreement in most of these negotiation periods: the TGV Est has been "under study" for over 15 years!

Journey Times