The age of the train: myth or reality?

[John Ashworth]

The age of the train: myth or reality?

Giving up flying should be easy, right? Today's trains are fast, efficient and comfortable aren't they? Tony Naylor is disappointed by the reality of international train travel

The Guardian 22 October 2009

You shouldn't be flying. I shouldn't be flying. We all know that. Which would explain why, recently, the British media has enthusiastically bought into the idea of international train travel as a realistic and relaxing alternative.

All you need is a laptop, a credit card, The Man In Seat 61 and, a few days later, you too can be waking, refreshed, as your night-train pulls into Berlin; or enjoying splendid Alpine views as you make your way to Milan. Or so the Sunday supplement version goes.

To an extent, I'm on board with all this. Four years ago, I decided to limit the number of times I would fly each year to one transatlantic flight, or two within Europe. Admittedly, this was driven as much by fear as a desire to live greenly. At the time, I hated getting on the big metal death bird in the sky. The idea of the train as a far more authentic and civilised - not to mention non-lethal - mode of travel was seductive.

The reality, however, is more complex. You see more of the world, for sure, but that is a mixed blessing. I now know that the Hamburg-Copenhagen rail-ferry is a splendid way to travel between the two, but also that Belgian train stations are some of the bleakest in Europe. Similarly, whilst I smiled at one American's startled reaction to Prague's dated but perfectly adequate main station - "Oh my God," she howled, "It's like a third world country." - sat, later, in a cramped, stuffy compartment, on a rackety old bit of rolling stock, I had to admit that this was no way to reach Munich in style.

This year, particularly, has brought the excitement and limitations of train travel into sharp contrast. A planned trip to America, with no internal flights, was nixed after discovering it would take three days (!) to travel from New York to San Francisco. Then there was a nine-hour odyssey from Manchester to Amsterdam which - booking, admittedly, two rather than three months in advance - ended up costing £150pp, plus the cost of a return ticket to London. I could have flown from Liverpool for 30 quid.

A recent trip taking in Lisbon, Madrid and Barcelona was similarly ridiculous. Booking online was a non-starter. There is an English language version, but after much swearing at a laptop, I had to abandon Renfe's website (notoriously user-unfriendly according to a Spanish contact), and book through their London office. In the meantime, I'd missed the discounted advance and e-ticket deals, which meant a cabin on the Lisbon-Madrid night-train cost £170 for two.

Night-train: it's an evocative phrase, isn't it? Less so stood on Lisbon's dull, modern Santa Apolonia station at 10pm on a Friday night. No-one is ever going to set Brief Encounter here, nor mistake a Renfe Trenhotel for the Orient Express.

Sure, the welcome is warm and efficient in that easy, multilingual way so alien to the British, and the cabin, if a little faded, was spick and span, and a feat of capsule engineering allows you to stow two hefty suitcases more easily than you might think. You even get a little complimentary bag of Renfe toiletries. However, stood in the empty, lifeless bar, nursing a Super Bock, enveloped in the inky blackness of the surrounding countryside at night, it would be a perverse traveller indeed who saw this as a highpoint of a holiday.

Not that you're here to party, of course, you're here to sleep, or try to. I managed about two hours in a nine-hour journey. Hard bed, noisy train, multiple stops, the bizarre sensation of waking to find yourself spiralling down Spanish mountainsides. Oddly, none of it lulled me to sleep. You wake to a (reasonably good) breakfast, bleary and unshowered, passing municipal dumps, shanty towns and fantastically ugly apartments. Welcome to Madrid!

It was an experience, alright. One I'll never repeat. Particularly as, later that week, I glimpsed The Future. Not only does the AVE high-speed link between Madrid and Barcelona cover the same 600km as the Lisbon-Madrid leg in under three hours, but it's supremely comfortable; relatively cheap (I got it for €42.65pp, one-way); there's leg and luggage room to spare; you get free headphones to enjoy the onboard radio and films; and, in the lively bar, they do a creditable cafe solo. The commuters may look bored by it all, but, for the first timer, the novelty of doing a silky smooth 300kmph through Spain's awesome spaghetti western interior, is quite something.

The fact remains, however, that this not the age of the train ... yet. In my experience, Europe is decades away from the kind of integrated rail network that would make people think twice about flying. Do you agree? Am I being too harsh? How have you found Europe-by-rail? Moreover, what practical steps could operators take to make European train travel more appealing: is it a matter of price, centralised booking, speed or comfort?

[John Ashworth]

A response from the "Man in Seat 61" of international train booking website fame:

Can you love train travel? Yes you can!

While Tony Naylor struggled with long-distance rail travel, The Man in Seat 61 counters that train journeys can be preferable for you and your wallet, as well as the planet. You just have to know where to look

The Guardian

I started Seat61.com in 2001, based on two premises. First, that taking the train into Europe was (and is) far more practical, affordable, swift and comfortable than most people imagine. And not just to Paris or Brussels either. And second, that finding out how to travel this way had become extremely difficult if not downright impossible, given the lack of integration between rail operators and the fragmentation of European booking systems. Eight years on, I stand by the truth of both premises, and the need to cut our carbon emissions makes it even more important to look at alternatives to flying. The truth is that not only is travelling by train a better bet for the planet, it's a better bet for the traveller too, and once you know where to look it CAN compete on price.

In November I'm giving a talk at Trinity College Dublin, and I easily booked a ticket from my local station to Dublin for £29 using the system linked from my own Ireland page. These rail and ferry tickets to Ireland are a bargain; a train ticket to Stansted Airport would have cost me £28.50 even before the cost of the flight. In December, I'm on the "Train to Copenhagen", a special train taking delegates to the conference on climate change. I'm returning with a day in Berlin, and the German Deutsche Bahn rail site readily sold me a £43 fare from central Berlin to central London, and let me print out my own ticket. Then I'm heading for Switzerland and Milan in November, and had little problem finding a £59 return ticket to Paris, a one-way from Paris to Geneva for £23, and a one way from Milan back to Paris for £40, at voyages-sncf.com. OK, I lie, I paid £64 from Milan to Paris, splashing out on first-class comfort for the leisurely trip back through he Alps. And unlike Tony Naylor I've had little problem with the Spanish rail site, where a few minutes is enough to nab a £26 ticket from Madrid to Seville and print out your own ticket.

In comparing train fares with so-called "budget" air fares, we need to be realistic about what "budget" air travel actually costs. I once wondered how much flying would have saved me, compared to the £200 return I spent getting myself, my wife and my baby son from central London to my in-laws in Enschede in the eastern Netherlands by train and ferry, including a comfortable cabin on the ship and an onwards rail ticket valid to any Dutch station. Ryanair.com offered me a £14.99 outward flight from Stansted to Eindhoven and a 79p flight for the return. A huge potential saving? Well, actually no. Clicking 'proceed', Ryanair transformed these fares into a total of £137 return for two adults and a baby once airport taxes and infant tickets were added. Add £20 in baggage fees, £52 for two £26 return tickets from London to Stansted Airport and another £50 for two train tickets from Eindhoven to Enschede, and it was train and ferry which was the cheaper option. Budget air fares may not be the bargain they first seem.

Then there is the issue of speed. Eurostar is already faster than flying from London to Paris or Brussels, but there's more to come. On 13 December, the new Brussels-Amsterdam high-speed line opens and Thalys trains from Brussels to Cologne also switch to a new high-speed line. London to Amsterdam will take as little as 4h 16 min, centre to centre with an easy 30-minute check-in and one simple change in Brussels. London-Cologne will take as little as 4h 11min. And here's another plus: 90-95% of Eurostars and other high-speed trains arrive on time, when some short-haul flights struggle to reach 65-70%.

But speed isn't everything, and sometimes the low-stress low-carbon overland way can take longer than flying. Changing the way you travel means a change in your outlook. Sitting strapped inside a plane or queuing at stressful airports, or droning down a motorway in a car or coach, it's easy to think of the journey as down time, dead time, something to be avoided or minimised.

I too enjoy my destinations, but I never regret the time spent watching the scenery with my feet up, spending time together with my family, catching up with my reading or even getting some work done on the laptop, when travelling by train. "Never travel without a good book and a corkscrew", as I always say.

[Derek Walker]

When we were in the UK last year we had to travel from Manchester to London and then onwards. We had the option of a flight, but I decided that train was the way to go and we caught the Virgin Pendolino to London instead. There was none of the agro of getting to the airport and the queues and booking in luggage and the agro on the other side at Heathrow. There was no grumpy officious person looking at us as if we were carrying a slightly used WMD. The trip down was stunning in spite of lousy weather. I got to see some of the countryside between the 2 cities, did not sit squashed into a too small seat and enjoyed the trip thoroughly. Incidently, my first since 2000 when I did Long Island Railroad into Penn Station which was equally enjoyable. What is steadily grating me about long distance air travel is the agro at airports, and the time wasted checking in and checking out and being treated like dirt at immigration (esp in the USA). I am a great supported of rail travel, and even more so of sea travel. Strewth, if I could go to work by ship I would! Its just a pity that rail travel in ZA has become less viable than it used to, and if I look at the favourable reports on this site I am really tempted to hop a train sommer because I can!