Trenitalia arrives in Paris-Lyon on December 18, ticket sales Monday
The Italian public company Trenitalia will put on sale from Monday the tickets of its high-speed trains Paris-Lyon-Turin-Milan, which it will launch on Saturday December 18 against SNCF TGVs, she announced on Friday 10 December. Trenitalia will thus become the first operator to challenge SNCF in the coveted high-speed market in France since this sector opened up to competition in December 2020.
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Italian high-speed trains must make two round trips per day, in the morning and in the evening, between Paris Gare de Lyon and Milan Centrale, passing through Lyon Part-Dieu, Chambéry, Modane and Turin. Subsequently, this offer should be supplemented with three daily round trips between Paris and Lyon, the most profitable high-speed connection of the SNCF which brings together 22 classic TGVs and 2 Ouigo per day.
“Frecciarossa»Or TGV
We can thus choose between the “Frecciarossa»(Red arrow, a train built by Hitachi Rail and Bombardier Transport) and the TGV between Paris and Lyon. The Italian company promises tickets from 23 euros in “comfort standard“(Equivalent of the second), and from 29 euros in”business comfort”(Equivalent of the first).
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For Paris-Milan, the first prices will be respectively 29 euros and 36 euros, according to a press release from Trenitalia which does not specify how high the price list goes. In addition to these two classes, Trenitalia also offers a “executive comfort class»Much more expensive and private rooms. The tickets will be exchangeable at will, and refundable until the departure of the train with a retention of 20%, according to the press release.
Unlike the Paris-Milan TGV, the Frecciarossa will take the Italian high-speed line between Milan and Turin and make a detour via Lyon. It will serve Milan central station, when its French competitor terminates at Porta Garibaldi, another station in the Lombard metropolis. If these are the first steps of Trenitalia in France on the way of high-speed trains, the Italian company was already present through its subsidiary Thello – renamed from Trenitalia France -, which announced at the end of June the closure of the two lines it operated there.
Thus, the Paris-Milan-Venice night train, whose circulation had been suspended since the start of the health crisis on March 10, 2020, has not resumed. The other line, the Marseille-Nice-Milan link, which Thello had been operating since 2014, was shut down on June 29.