French Company Proposes New Sleeper Train Network

A French company wants to connect Paris and 12 other European cities with a network of sleeper trains, "hoping post-Covid interest in cleaner, greener travel will generate interest in its proposed 'hotels on rails'," writes Kim Willsher in The Guardian. The company, Midnight Trains, "plans to serve at least a dozen destinations between 500 and 900 miles from Paris, including cities in Spain, Portugal, Italy, Belgium, Germany, Denmark and Scotland" and begin service in 2024.

"Midnight Trains is the latest arrival in what is becoming a crowded market. Across Europe, state-run railways are facing new competition from private operators looking to introduce night trains." In recent years, Europe's sleeper cars "were being consigned to the economic sidings, driven out of business by low-cost flights and long-distance buses. Since then, however, public concerns over the climate emergency have led to a surge of interest in reviving night routes across the continent." The European Commission's Sustainable and Smart Mobility Strategy, a plan that lays out Europe's goals and strategies for fighting climate change and building resiliency, "calls for a major shift in passengers to rail, including night trains."

More trains, writes David Burroughs in the International Railway Journal, could "play an important role in reducing transport emissions." As he writes, "[i]f operators are able to fully develop attractive services to meet the growing demands from passengers, while overcoming the major challenges they face, it could mark the start of a major new era in the post-pandemic world, and offer a major boon for the rail sector."