Cross Channel Commuter Service

According to an article I read in the online edition of the UK Daily Telegraph, there is a proposal to set up a commuter link between northern France and the London and Southeast areas of England. This would allow Britons to take advantage of lower property prices in France yet commute to jobs in the UK, as well as French people taking advantage of the job opportunities in the UK.

Proposed stops are Stratford, Ashford, Calais, Cote d'Opale, Lille, and possibly Bruges.

The infrastructure is already there for the most part so I imagine this would mostly involve acquiring new equipment to run the services. Apparently there is still plenty of spare capacity in the channel tunnel for this.

The time frame would be when the current service is opened up to competition in 14 months. Of course this is just a proposal and whether or not it happens is to be seen.

I wonder if this would be the first example of international commuter services or whether others already exist. I imagine there must be places already in Europe where such service exists either intentionally or otherwise.

Jon

This idea goes back several years. The previous (mainly British) direction of Eurotunnel proposed to build a housing estate in Calais for British residents who couldn't afford the then prices in Kent. However, the financial collapse of Eurotunnel came and the present French direction is not much interested in the idea, as far as I know.

I thought at the time that a commuter service would be necessary, much like the trains that run from Koebnhavn to Malmoe. However, there is a major problem against it. The Home Office is paranoid about anything that makes entry into Britain easier. They would insist that all travellers go through the full immigration procedure every time they travelled. That rules out stops at any station other than Calais, Lille, St Pancras, Ebbsfleet and Ashford (perhaps Stratford if it ever opens). Travellers would have to go through a passport check on arrival in Britain. As my wife is American I have experienced this at Waterloo - the experience was almost as bad as at an airport. (We missed our bus back home to Dorset).

The trains to run this service might be the Javelins, though they have not been submitted for tunnel safety tests, and perhaps wouldn't be passed for it. In that case a new type of train would be needed. I suppose a spare Eurostar set might be started from Lille.

I wonder if this would be the first example of international commuter services or whether others already exist. I imagine there must be places already in Europe where such service exists either intentionally or otherwise.

There are many cross border commuting areas. Some people working in the Dublin area buy houses in the North. Probably they mostly drive but some will take the Enterprise.

Lille has many people who cross the border from Belgium - part of the urban area is actually in Belgium. Bratislava to Wien is another area - cheaper houses in Slovakia. Between Denmark and Sweden there is now a connected urban area thanks to the new bridge and tunnel.
I am not sure about Frankfort an der Oder but I suspect there are Poles who work in Berlin.

There are two conditions that would be necessary to encourage commuting to London. One is that Britain joins Schengen; the other is that Britain adopts the euro. Right now the pound is tending to fall against the euro so that property prices in Calais are looking less attractive by the day. Neither of these things show much chance of happening. It is just possible that the main objection Brown had against joining the eurozone was that the pound was too high (nearly 10 old francs to the pound; whereas now it is more like 8); but I suspect he has more fundamental objections. As for Schengen the Home Office civil servants are dead against that.

jonnhrr wrote:According to an article I read in the online edition of the UK Daily Telegraph, there is a proposal to set up a commuter link between northern France and the London and Southeast areas of England. This would allow Britons to take advantage of lower property prices in France yet commute to jobs in the UK, as well as French people taking advantage of the job opportunities in the UK.


Jon

There is a report about this in the current edition of Rail magazine, the fortnightly. Basically theu are thinking of a different style of service - trains that stop more often and may begin at other locations in Belgium. Bruges is mentioned.

From 2010 the European Directive (think Federal Law) on rail access comes into force. This requires all rail administrations to allow operators of other companies to use their tracks. This means that Eurostar would lose its monopoly of tunnel services.

The new company might be called Transmanche Metro. In England it would follow the existing High Speed One route from St Pancras, possibly stopping at all the stations with immigration facilities (Stratford, Ebbsfleet and Ashford). On the other side it would stop at Calais TGV (rather few Eurostars stop there), Lille, Cote d'Opale ( I think a new station) and maybe Bruges. However, some of these stations on the other side have no immigration checks. I think the Home Office would put its oar in there.

There is a hint that the Metro service might use Javelins, designed for the domestic services along HS1. But of course these have not been passed for travel through the tunnel, and might need modification. So the proposals are still at a rather preliminary stage. There may be a few surplus Eurostar trains, but not all that many.

There is also the possibility of trains other than Eurostar using the tunnel. Possibly German ICE, but I have seen reports that this will not happen. The Safety procedure is a high cost to deter entry.

Property is not necessarily cheaper in France now than in Britain. The pound has gone down against the eur and house prices are also going down.