Train line on the right bank of the Rhône: at Pont-Saint-Esprit station, the first travelers leave for Avignon
Meeting with the first users of the TER on the right bank, happy and relieved.
Pont-Saint-Esprit station, 7:10 a.m., this Monday, August 29 in the morning. The sun is rising. Emmanuelle Arnaud, director of SNCF TER Occitanie lines, and an agent from the Region welcome the first travelers from the passenger line on the right bank of the Rhône. Direction Avignon.
On board the train, we are eight passengers. Joined by two other people at Bagnols station. In the voice of the controller, Jean-Pascal, we feel the joy of announcing “welcome aboard”. There are those who will take a connection, like Marion who returns to Paris. There are employees, relieved. “I’m going to take it every day. When I get off the train in Avignon, I get on the tram, Cindy rejoices. I signed all the petitions for the return of the train. If we had been able to have it during the work on the tram in Avignon… It’s more than wonderful. I savor the landscapes.”
For Sébastien, it’s downright godsend. This Monday was his first day of work in Avignon, where he has just been silent. Further on, in the train, there are Maeva and Sarah, mother and daughter, from Saint-Paulet-de-Caisson. The young woman will study in the city of the Popes, she will stay to live with her family. “Without the train, we would have asked ourselves the question of renting a studio or going to study elsewhere.”
I didn’t want to miss this first train, we waited so long
In this first train, there is also Daniel Emery, a railway expert who lives not far away, in Viviers (Ardèche). Teacher in Lausanne and at the National School of Bridges and Roads (Paris), it is absolutely necessary to be there. Avignon, time for a coffee on Place des Corps-Saints, he is seated for the return trip, departing from Avignon at 8:39 a.m. There, other travelers are savoring this historic moment: Alexandre, SNCF traffic officer at Villefort (Lozere). He comes from Grau-du-Roi, “I love the train!”, and will visit Pont-Saint-Esprit.
Or Michel who lives in Berre-l’Etang. Curious, he comes to discover this sector that he does not know. Two cyclists boarded, including Laurent, a teacher who works in Marcoule. He hopes that the schedule for the Uggo shuttle leaving for Marcoule will be adapted. Thirteen people took this Avignon-Pont-Saint-Esprit. Including France, who arrives from Narbonne and is going to visit her Bagnolese family. “I didn’t want to miss this first train, we waited so long for it!”, she confides, relieved to do without the highway she hates.
In Bagnols, a person gets on the TER. In seven minutes, here we are in Pont, at 9:09 a.m. On the platform, Jean-Claude, a resident of the station, observes and intends to write to the Region, to the SCNF… “There is no longer a water point at the station, no WC. Will the station remain closed? We recommend soft travel, will there be a bicycle shelter secure? Finally, a single oar would suffice for the moment. There, there are three.” He regrets the vegetation sacrificed on the altar of the Multimodal Pole site. But recognize “all the efforts that have been made”.
A lucky driver
Cédric was the pilot of this first TER Pont-Saint-Esprit Bagnols-Avignon, on Monday August 29. He would go back and forth again. He considers himself lucky, he who travels on different lines: “We have a magnificent region, between ponds and seas, between Perpignan and Narbonne; from Nîmes to Toulouse…” With this new line, his profession “is even more varied. view from the office is really not bad!”
The Ardèche is still waiting
While the inaugural train was circulating in the Gard on Sunday, the Ardéchois gathered for a big picnic in front of the Teil station, in which 100 to 150 people took part. Yesterday at Avignon station, on the train announcement screens, the train for Pont-Saint-Esprit was announced as going to Teil.
He goes there, of course, but without travelers for the moment. That’s where he turns around. In our edition tomorrow, we will take stock of the future of the line on the right bank, on the Ardèche side.
Jean-Marie Daver
Former elected representative of Pont-Saint-Esprit and the Gard Rhone urban community, Jean-Marie-Daver is one of the militant figures of the users’ association who have ardently campaigned for the return of the train. “When we arrested him fifty years ago, we said it was a bad deal, it was a mistake, the facts proved us right. Fortunately, we didn’t give up.”
Anthony Cellier
It was his first public appearance since his defeat in the legislative elections on Sunday June 26. The now ex-MP for the third constituency also reacted to the arrival of the train for travelers on the right bank of the Rhône: “I am delighted to see that the entire Republican and Democratic political spectrum has expressed itself in favor of this decarbonization that President Delga has limited. The train is a solution to reduce our carbon footprint.”