# MISC | Comparison of Railway Services in Europe



## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

Being the sad loser that I am, I decided to spend several hours comparing rail services in different regions of western europe a few days ago using the various national rail websites, here are the results.

I’ve chosen a few selected journeys on the regular rail routes around Western Europe and looked at the various national rail websites to see timings, ticket prices (and ticket availability) to make a comparison of rail services.

The figures for each trip are 

1, Distance between cities (from viamichelin.com)
2, Average time of best services (doesn’t include much slower or indirect services if there is a regular fast service)
3, Average speed
4, Cost for return ticket leaving next day (returning day after)
5, Cost for return ticket leaving in 7 days (returning day after)
6, Cost for return ticket leaving in 1 month (returning day after)
7, Average cost per 100km 
8, Frequency of services
9, Number of changes required

All costs have been converted to € for comparison


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

Region 1 – Germany

Trip 1: Hamburg-Dortmund

333 Km
2H55
114 km/h
€112
€90
€90
€14.59 / 100 Km
2 trains per hour
Direct, no changes

Trip 2: Stuttgart-Hannover

505 Km
3H51
131 km/h
€206
€118
€98
€13.93 / 100 Km
Hourly service
Direct, no changes

Trip 3: Nuremburg-Leipzig

272 Km
3H05
88 Km/h
€114
€58
€58
€14.20 / 100 Km
1-2 trains per hour
Direct or 1 change


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

Region 2: France

Trip 1: Nantes-Bordeaux

408 Km
04H00
102 Km/h
€83.20
€83.20
€51.00
€8.88 / 100 Km
1 every 2-3 hours, less at weekends
Direct, no changes

Trip 2: Lyon-Montpellier

298 Km
01H55
157 Km/h
€95.00
€63.00
€52.00
€11.74 / 100 Km
1 train per hour
Direct, No changes

Trip 3: Paris-Cherbourg

352 Km
03H00
117 Km/h
€82.40
€80.20
€42.00
€9.69 / 100 Km
1 train per hour
Direct or 1 change


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

Region 3: United Kingdom

Trip 1: Bournemouth-London

172 Km
02H00
94 Km/h
€64.63
€26.94
€26.94
€11.48 / 100 Km
3 trains per hour
Direct or 1 change

Trip 2: Bristol-Leeds

335 Km
03H35
93 Km/h
€122.35
€122.35
€106.74
€17.48 / 100 Km
2 trains per hour
Direct or 1 change

Trip 3: Manchester-Glasgow

345 Km
03H25
101 Km/h
€84.22
€63.31
€79.50
€10.97 / 100 Km
1 or 2 trains per hour
Direct or 1 change


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

Region 4: Italy

Trip 1: Milano-Trieste

407 Km
04H18
95 Km/h
€68.20
€68.20
€68.20
€8.38 / 100 Km
1 per hour
1 change

Trip 2: Roma-Genova

488 Km
05H22
91 Km/h
€59.20
€59.20
€57.20
€6.00 / 100 Km
1 train per hour
Direct, no changes

Trip 3: Napoli-Bari

265 Km
04H00
66 Km/h
€60.80
€60.80
€60.80
€11.47 / 100 Km
1 train per 2 hours
1 change


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

Region 5: Benelux

Trip 1 Rotterdam-Liege

188 Km
03H06
61 Km/h
€38.40
€64.00
€42.60
€12.85 / 100 Km
2 trains per hour
1 or 2 changes

Trip 2: Maastrict-Groningen

331 Km
04H25
75 Km/h
€71.00
€71.00
€71.00
€10.73 / 100 Km
2 trains per hour
1 or 2 changes

Trip 3: Luxembourg-Antwerp

247 Km
03H46
66 Km/h
€41.00
€41.00
€41.00
€8.30 / 100 Km
1 train per hour
1 change


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

Region 6 – Spain & Portugal

Trip 1: Valencia-Madrid

365 Km
03H25
107 Km/h
€66.88
€66.88
€66.88
€9.16 / 100 Km
1 train per 1-2 hours
Direct, no changes

Trip 2: Barcelona-Bilbao

608Km
09H12
66 Km/h
€60.96
€60.96
€60.96
€5.02 / 100 Km
1 train per day
Direct, no changes

Trip 3: Lisboa-Oporto

320 Km
02H46
116 Km/h
€55.00
€55.00
€55.00
€8.59 / 100 Km
1 train per hour
Direct, no changes


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

Region 7 – Scandinavia

Trip 1: Oslo-Malmo

570 Km
07H20
78 Km/h
€183.26
€174.25
€137.98
€14.49 / 100 Km
5 trains per day
1 change

Trip 2: Copenhagen-Aalborg

297 Km
04H40
64 Km/h
€90.58
€90.58
€90.58
€15.25 / 100 Km
1 train per hour
Direct, no changes

Trip 3: Stockholm-Gothenburg

469 Km
03H25
137 Km/h
€182.17
€125.11
€59.01
€13.02 / 100 Km
1 train per hour
Direct, no changes


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

Of course these comparison don't tell you how comfortable the train is, how good the station facilities are or how reliable the services are but my general conclusions were:

Germany 

+ Fast, frequent, comprehensive network
- More expensive than most

France

+ Fast, comprehensive network, good value
- trains not as frequent as some but overall probably the best network

UK

+ Comprehensive network, good frequency
- Speed reasonable but not great, expensive if not pre-booked

Italy

+ Cheap, good network especially in North, reasonably frequent services
- Speeds not great, Napoli-Bari especially slow

Benelux

+ Good frequency, very dense network, costs reasonable
- slow services

Spain & Portugal

+ Good value, fast services between some cities
- Not very frequent, poor or non-existent links between some major cities (eg Seville-Lisbon, Alicante-Malaga)

Scandinavia

+ Good fast service between Stockholm-Gothenburg, reasonable network in most populated areas of Denmark and Sweden.
- expensive, poor links to Norway, can be slow.


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## DiggerD21 (Apr 22, 2004)

Just a few days ago an italian from Milano complained that italian railways are expensive. I disagreed. And your comparison (while of course not representative) confirms my view of italian rail services being reasonably priced.

Have you taken the normal prices at the german railways or also special offers, if available (surf&rail, sparpreis 25, sparpreis 50, etc... Just too many tariffs!)


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

DiggerD21 said:


> Just a few days ago an italian from Milano complained that italian railways are expensive. I disagreed. And your comparison (while of course not representative) confirms my view of italian rail services being reasonably priced.
> 
> Have you taken the normal prices at the german railways or also special offers, if available (surf&rail, sparpreis 25, sparpreis 50, etc... Just too many tariffs!)


I took the best prices available for the particular day, for germany it was usually the full price for next day travel and sparpreis 25/50 for travel in one week or one month. Same goes for UK, France, Belgium and Sweden where advance tickets can be much cheaper. Interestingly the mediterranean countries, Denmark and the Netherlands seem to have far less variable pricing.

To me Italian railways seem quite good value.


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## eusebius (Jan 5, 2004)

From one sad loser to another: travelling from Rotterdam via Brussels to Lièges is quicker! 2:57

The busiest stations in NL:

Utrecht
Amsterdam
Rotterdam
The Hague
Arnhem
Den Bosch

perhaps not in that order but Utrecht is #1

The website for NL railways is reliable to the extent that in my case, I have a quicker connection than suggested on my way to Utrecht. That is because the station is under reconstruction and it's a wide margin used on the website.

I find regional rail in my country to be excellent. Like nighttrains in the weekend to my small town from Arnhem.

Just a week ago I saw a very critical report on Deutsche Bahn on German TV. Regional services in Germany are being cut in favour of high speed rail. A very nice little city like Hof in Bayern will lose its connection!


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## eusebius (Jan 5, 2004)

Jonesy55 said:


> I took the best prices available for the particular day, for germany it was usually the full price for next day travel and sparpreis 25/50 for travel in one week or one month. Same goes for UK, France, Belgium and Sweden where advance tickets can be much cheaper. Interestingly the mediterranean countries, Denmark and the Netherlands seem to have far less variable pricing.
> 
> To me Italian railways seem quite good value.


Pricing in NL is confusing because of the student cards for public transport. I used to have a year card which my boss paid for, 1. class but now I have a 40% discount after 9 in the morning.

Arnhem-Amsterdam is 102km, 1h00, €14, 40% discount > €8.40 + extra charge for the ICE (skips stations and goes faster) €2=€10.40


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## eusebius (Jan 5, 2004)

And I forgot, it's even trickier in the NL: income tax over that year card! Tax benefits too. Too complicated to go into detail really. Good for employment at the tax offices


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

How much do you have to pay for the discount card?

We have cards in the UK costing £20 for a year that give 33% off fares but you can only get them if you are under 26 or over 60.

There's also a family railcard for £20 that gives 33% off adult fares and 60% off (already half price) child fares but only when a child travels so you can't use it for commuting unless you take the kids to work and lock them in a cupboard!

I didn't include any reductions using cards like these because it would have been just too complicated!


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## dennol (Sep 11, 2002)

eusebius said:


> The busiest stations in NL:
> 
> Utrecht
> Amsterdam
> ...


Leiden and Eindhoven are busier than Arnhem and Den Bosch.


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## Yardmaster (Jun 1, 2004)

Jonesy55 said:


> Of course these comparison don't tell you how comfortable the train is, how good the station facilities are or how reliable the services are but my general conclusions were:
> 
> Germany
> 
> ...


Good job! Appreciated!


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

Tickets are very complicated, on my commuting route Shrewsbury-Birmingham (80Km, 50-70 mins) there are no advance booking discounts because the route isn't long enough but there are still multiple fares.

A single ticket is £9.80
An overnight return ticket is £12.20
A same day return ticket is £12.00 if you travel on peak trains
A same day return ticket is £9.90 if you travel off peak.

A weekly ticket is £38.50 (works out at £7.70 return based on 5 days)
A monthly ticket is £147.50 (about £7.38 return based on 20 days)
An annual ticket is £1,515 (about £6.31 return based on 240 days)

:dizzy:


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## eusebius (Jan 5, 2004)

Jonesy55 said:


> How much do you have to pay for the discount card?
> 
> We have cards in the UK costing £20 for a year that give 33% off fares but you can only get them if you are under 26 or over 60.
> 
> ...


Yes, it is complicated, and changes all of the time with railway companies offering new types of discounts. This after 9 in the morning year card is €49, no age limit. It's being integrated into one Public Transport chipcard which still has teething problems. I have that card already but can only use it in trains. No age limit. It used to be a museum year card as well but the crooks cancelled that! There's a fair offer on trips abroad for little money but not as cheap as the 'promotions' you'll find on he SNCF Voyages website.

It pays off to compare NS, NMBS, SNCF, DB etc websites for cross-border trips.

The seniors get a number of days of free travel in NL - always a warning to the others: grey haired masses ahead


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## eusebius (Jan 5, 2004)

dennol said:


> Leiden and Eindhoven are busier than Arnhem and Den Bosch.


I couldn't find your post on the NL forum so I was guessing. Thanks.


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## hix (Jun 11, 2006)

The connections you have taken in the Benelux or not the most obvious. Why not Amsterdam-Brussels, Oostende-Liege or Paris-Brussels? And if you compaire national connections in Germany with international connections in other countries that would give a wrong idea. May you could take Köln-Vienna or Berlin-Warschau for instance?
In Belgium almost nobody pays full price.


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## eusebius (Jan 5, 2004)

Neither did he give the most frequented services in other countries. I mean, who would go to Cherbourg?? To that extent I think it's fair comparison.


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

hix said:


> The connections you have taken in the Benelux or not the most obvious. Why not Amsterdam-Brussels, Oostende-Liege or Paris-Brussels? And if you compaire national connections in Germany with international connections in other countries that would give a wrong idea. May you could take Köln-Vienna or Berlin-Warschau for instance?
> In Belgium almost nobody pays full price.


:laugh:, I knew people would complain about my choices, I tried to avoid the most obvious fast routes whilst not being too obscure. I treated Benelux as one area because a) it's pretty well integrated in many fields and b) it's small so national services are short, you can walk across Belgium in an hour and Luxembourg is smaller than my garden 

I think it's impossible to make a totally fair and accurate comparison in every respect.


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

eusebius said:


> The seniors get a number of days of free travel in NL - always a warning to the others: grey haired masses ahead


Pensioners in Wales are now getting free rural rail services as an experiment that may be extended.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/6180746.stm


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## hix (Jun 11, 2006)

Sorry, I didn't want to criticise. You're right about the difficulty of compairing different systems.
However, I'm in France quite often and I'm always disapointed about the service of non-TGV lines. Arles-Nimes for instances is a terrible connection. And very often quite big cities in France (+- 50.000 to 150.00 inh.) are only connected 5 times a day with other cities...
I have the greatest respect for the work you've done! Never could do a better job!:banana:


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## hix (Jun 11, 2006)

In Belgium 60 + people ride free on train and bus. Also working people commute free every day. Young people get a cheap go-pass. And there's always special prices and offers like: weekend at sea or in the Ardennes. For people like me who do not commute or who are too old and too young there's the rail-pass, who give a good price for day-trips...


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

Working people commute free? Does the employer have to pay?


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## eusebius (Jan 5, 2004)

Jonesy55 said:


> I treated Benelux as one area because a) it's pretty well integrated in many fields



It was through searching further because of this thread that I found out that ns.nl smoothly leads onto the Belgian railways dot be. One would only notice it from looking at the address bar. The website design remained exactly the same. Jonesy holds a point here.

Maybe this thread should focus on learning from regional services in individual countries rather than compare connections via high speed rail or intercity links - as they're known in the Netherlands.

France and Britain can be compared; Paris and London easily are the most important cities in the respective countries. It's different in most european countries though.

The major switchboard in the Netherlands is Utrecht, not Amsterdam.


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## dennol (Sep 11, 2002)

Jonesy55 said:


> I treated Benelux as one area because a) it's pretty well integrated in many fields


Since I don't own a car I would love to agree but unfortunately I have to disagree. 

Public transport between the Netherlands and Belgium (and Germany also) is generally very poor. I don't live far from both borders but there is no direct train or even bus going there. Visiting Germany or Belgium requires changing trains in Venlo, Maastricht or Roosendaal with longer waiting times and crappy trains that only go once every hour. 

Antwerp is only 45 minutes by car from Eindhoven, but almost 2 hours by train. A flatmate of mine visited Leuven this weekend and you don't want to know how long it took him to get there by train. Let's just say that thanks to Ryanair it's faster and easier to get to London from Eindhoven than to Leuven. Probably cheaper too.


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## Justme (Sep 11, 2002)

Germany's system is quite reasonable and comprehensive - maybe because of the stranglehold of a single company, DB. This does have many advantages but of cause many disadvantages as well.

Prices can be high, but some people by the 25% or 50% bahn cards. I have the 50% which as suggested, drops 50% off the fare. This costs €206 a year.

You don't get as good specials as you can find in the UK, sometimes they are real cheap there, but only if booked a while in advanced. But short distances in the UK can be terribly expensive on National Rail, especially if you buy the day. There also seems to be such a confusion with fares, with so many different types and many specials that you have to check hard to see if you qualify.

But thanks for the excellent post.


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## hix (Jun 11, 2006)

Jonesy55 said:


> Working people commute free? Does the employer have to pay?


I don't know exactly but I think the employer pays half and the federal gouverment pays the other half.


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## Guest (Aug 16, 2007)

Jonesy55 said:


> Spain & Portugal
> 
> + Good value, fast services between some cities
> - Not very frequent, poor or non-existent links between some major cities (eg Seville-Lisbon, Alicante-Malaga)


I completly agree with that. I think the there are non-existant links between Malaga-Alicante, for example, because Spain has a low population density(It's the second largest european country, behind France and it's only around 45 million). So railnet is relatively poor compared with other european countries.Besides, trains are more expensive than coaches.That's why people tends to use coaches instead of trains.


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## Joshapd (May 21, 2004)

I found it really shocking to see how little trains there are between big cities in Spain. Like 3 or 4 a day! Well that was at least the case in Andalusia.


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## hix (Jun 11, 2006)

Yeah, in Holland you have four trains per hour between cities!


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## SFC (Aug 2, 2007)

mij2 said:


> I found it really shocking to see how little trains there are between big cities in Spain. Like 3 or 4 a day! Well that was at least the case in Andalusia.


Well, Between Seville-Cordoba-Granade and Seville-Cadiz the service is well, about 1:30 hour per each, and between Cordoba you could take High Speed AVE every 25 minutes. But with Malaga, Extremadura and Portugal the connections are very bads, with Malaga, 3 or 4 every day, with Extremadura only 1 per day, and with Portugal the Service is inexisting. But the trains are very cheap and the speed is ok, about 120 Km/h. Price between Seville and Cadiz or Cordoba is about 15€ return ticket, and 25€ for AVE.


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## SmarterChild (Jun 19, 2007)

Anyways, some intercity routes may also be less serviced by trains because of reliable bus services with competitive prices.


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## Jonesy55 (Jul 30, 2004)

SFC said:


> Well, Between Seville-Cordoba-Granade and Seville-Cadiz the service is well, about 1:30 hour per each, and between Cordoba you could take High Speed AVE every 25 minutes. But with Malaga, Extremadura and Portugal the connections are very bads, with Malaga, 3 or 4 every day, with Extremadura only 1 per day, and with Portugal the Service is inexisting. But the trains are very cheap and the speed is ok, about 120 Km/h. Price between Seville and Cadiz or Cordoba is about 15€ return ticket, and 25€ for AVE.


I took the train from Seville to Cadiz a couple of years ago and the service seemed pretty good, also from Algeciras to Ronda was good too but for most of the journeys on that trip we had to take the bus like Ayamonte-Seville, Cadiz-Algeciras, Ronda-Malaga, Malaga-Granada and Granada-Murcia.


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## Guest (Aug 17, 2007)

SmarterChild said:


> Anyways, some intercity routes may also be less serviced by trains because of reliable bus services with competitive prices.


And planes. For example Barcelona-Madrid is the most bussy air route in the world. 
The case of Alicante-Málaga, for example, they are 500km away (despite the fact that they seem to be very close in the map). They have coach/plane service every day. A Coruña-Barcelona is about 1200km away like Barcelona-Cádiz, or A Coruña-Cádiz. The medium distance between spanish cities is about 600-800 km, which is far superior compared with the rest of european countries. Current train is useful in short-medium distances, but not in longest ones.That's why the importance of high speed trains in Spain.

The trains in Spain can be:

Short distance or "Cercanías", which their frequency is about 5/10 minutes per route in Madrid or Barcelona. 




























Medium distance or "Regionales"




























Long distance or "Largo recorrido" (ONLY non high speed trains)

Tren Estrella (night-train)










Talgo (Spanish company) is the king of long-distance train (high speed and current speed). 

Euromed (Barcelona-Valencia)











Talgo services:

*Talgo III*
Talgo Miguel de Unamuno: Barcelona-Sants - Castejón de Ebro - Bilbao-Abando / Irún - Hendaye-(SNCF) / Salamanca 
Talgo Covadonga-Finisterre: Barcelona-Sants - Vigo / A Coruña-San Cristóbal / Gijón-Cercanías 




*Talgo III RD*










Talgo Barcelona Estació de França - Portbou/Cerbère - Montpellier 

*Talgo IV*

Altaria: A Coruña-San Cristóbal / Pontevedra - Madrid Chamartín - Alacant Terminal 
Talgo: A Coruña-San Cristóbal / Pontevedra - Madrid Chamartín 
Talgo: Madrid Chamartín - Bilbao-Abando 
Talgo: Madrid Chamartín - Santander 
Talgo: Madrid Chamartín - Gijón-Cercanías 
Altaria: Madrid Chamartín - Albacete - Murcia del Carmen - Cartagena 

*Talgo 200 / Talgo VI*
Talgo VI








Talgo 200











Talgo 200: Madrid Puerta de Atocha-Málaga con cambio de ancho de vía en el intercambiador de Antequera-Santa Ana. 
Talgo Mare Nostrum horario: Montpellier - Cartagena 
Talgo Lorca horario : Barcelona Estació de França - Lorca-Sutullena 
Talgo Extremadura : Madrid Chamartín - Badajoz 
Altaria Triana horario : Barcelona Sants -Cádiz 
Altaria : Madrid-Puerta de Atocha -Cádiz / Huelva con cambio de ancho de vía en el intercambiador de Majarabique en Sevilla. 
Trenhotel Antonio Machado horario : Barcelona Sants - Cádiz 
Trenhotel Gibralfaro horario : Barcelona Sants - Granada/Málaga (la composición de éste tren va mezclada con remolques de diferentes series) 
Trenhotel Francisco de Goya horario : Madrid Chamartín - Paris Gare d'Austerlitz 
Trenhotel Joan Miró: Barcelona Estació de França - Paris Gare d'Austerlitz 
Trenhotel Pau Casals: Barcelona Estació de França - Zürich Hauptbanhof 
Trenhotel Salvador Dalí: Barcelona Estació de França - Milano-Centrale 
Trenhotel Lusitania horario : Madrid Chamartín - Lisboa Santa Apolónia (la composición de éste tren va mezclada con remolques de diferentes series) 
Trenhotel : Madrid Chamartín - A Coruña-San Cristóbal/Vigo-Pontevedra 
DB-NachtZug EN-1900/1901 Pluto : Berlin-Lichtenberg - München Ostbanhof 

*Talgo VII*



















Talgo: Santander - Madrid Chamartín - Alacant Terminal 
Talgo: Gijón-Cercanías - Madrid Chamartín - Alacant Terminal 
Altaria Alacant Terminal - Madrid-Chamartín 
Altaria-Triana Barcelona-Sants - Cádiz 
Altaria Barcelona-Sants - Madrid-Puerta de Atocha 
Altaria Madrid-Puerta de Atocha - Iruña-Pamplona 
Altaria Madrid-Puerta de Atocha - Logroño 
Altaria Madrid-Puerta de Atocha - Irún / Hendaye-SNCF) 
Altaria Madrid-Chamartín - Almería / Granada 

*Talgo 350*










AVE Madrid-Puerta de Atocha - Camp de Tarragona 
Futuro AVE Madrid-Puerta de Atocha - Valladolid-Campo Grande 

http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talgo


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## TohrAlkimista (Dec 18, 2006)

Really great job Jonesy, chapeau!


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## Club_Dru (Jul 11, 2007)

I live at the German border in the city of Enschede. We have an excellent connection with Dortmund and Münster. The German railservice departs every 30 minutes. The Amsterdam connection is only once every our. And there's not even a direct connection with our capital. 









In Hengelo a city 8 km nearby Enschede, you can depart every two hours directly to Berlin (Deutsche Bahn Internationale train). More railwaycompanies have taken lines over from the Nationale Dutch Railways NS. In Hengelo you have a lightrailcompagnie Syntus. There a plans to take over a line to the German city Bad Bentheim.









Almelo a city 10km nearby Hengelo. Twents railwaycompany


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