London St. Pancras Highspeed and Eurotunnel have today announced a landmark partnership to accelerate the growth of cross-Channel high-speed rail, marking a pivotal step towards transforming sustainable and efficient international travel between the UK and Europe.
The UK’s only high-speed rail infrastructure operator, London St. Pancras Highspeed, and Eurotunnel, owned by Paris based company Getlink, share a commitment to expand rail connectivity on both sides of the English Channel. Through this strategic growth partnership, both parties will cooperate more closely to lay the foundations for increased cross-Channel rail traffic, with the aim of creating new routes and destinations along the line.
The parties have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) which outlines a variety of important steps designed to deepen collaboration on innovation and engineering initiatives. These include exploring opportunities to shorten journey times, improve timetable coordination, and align more closely on growth strategies, as well as working together to introduce more trains each hour for international services in each direction.
These enhancements will make rail travel faster, more efficient and widely available – aiming to make rail travel the preferred transport option to the continent.
The MoU follows the announcement of a new study by London St. Pancras Highspeed which highlights the potential to increase current international passenger capacity in St. Pancras up to nearly 5,000 per hour in a bid to unlock the untapped potential of the iconic London station and high-speed line.
As champions of sustainable transportation, London St. Pancras Highspeed and Eurotunnel are committed to advocating ‘rail first’ public policies and will actively collaborate with governments to emphasise the environmental advantages of rail journeys under six hours.
Robert Sinclair, CEO of London St. Pancras Highspeed, says:
“Joining forces with Eurotunnel is another exciting step on our journey to realise a future where high-speed rail is the preferred option for travelling to Europe.“
“As we see demand for international rail travel grow, London St. Pancras Highspeed and Eurotunnel have an important role to play as key infrastructure managers to actively work together to encourage new and existing train operators to expand capacity and launch new destinations unlocking the potential of a fully connected Europe.”
Yann Leriche, CEO of Getlink says: “As an open access infrastructure, Eurotunnel is the pioneer in enabling growth of high-speed rail between the UK and Continental Europe. We are keen to drive forward attractive opportunities for low-carbon mobility with a range of new destinations in Germany, Switzerland and France. This partnership with London St. Pancras Highspeed is an essential catalyst for accelerating this growth momentum.”
Image credit: iStock
