Image d’illustration (Photo by ERIC CABANIS / AFP)
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As of next year, the Railcoop railway cooperative should offer two return trips per day between Lyon and Bordeaux. A means of once again invigorating territories abandoned by the main rail lines. The return of a service removed in 2014 by the SNCF for lack of profitability, the success and sustainability of which will be strongly scrutinized.
It is a line that would have been 150 years old this year. A transverse intended to connect Lyon and the Atlantic Ocean by cutting the Massif Central. A section of which the last part was abandoned by the SNCF in 2014, at the time of the high-speed train and the reduction of space / time, for lack of passengers, profitability and because of the long duration of the path to cover the end-to-end distance. However, Lyon-Bordeaux could well make its comeback on the tracks of the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes and Nouvelle-Aquitaine regions under the impetus of a cooperative created in Figeac, in the Lot. A project called Railcoop, born from the opening up to competition, imposed by the European Union, of the French rail sector. This new line will serve Roanne, Saint-Germain-des-Fossés, Gannat, Montluçon, Guéret, Saint-Sulpice-Laurière, Limoges, Périgueux and Libourne.
“For us speed is not what should be emphasized”
“The idea germinated in the mind of Nicolas Debaisieux (current Managing Director of Railcoop, Editor’s note) who operated tourist trains in New Aquitaine. He said to himself:” How is it that there are stations and tracks and that there is no service with? “. He then decided to become a rail operator to recreate a service between small towns without going through Paris and revitalize the territories of these forgotten towns”, explains Dominique Guerrée, chairman of the cooperative’s board of directors. A real counterpart to the strategy of the SNCF, which has chosen to rationalize its costs by reducing all its lines to the Paris hub. This retired manager of several scops in Auvergne and former administrator of the regional union of scops is part of the team that decided to embark on this somewhat crazy adventure alongside rail enthusiasts.
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