IntroductionEurostar is a huge part of Europe's High Speed Rail but if you see actually how big the network is, you'll be surprised. Eurostar doesn't have a very large network and it is only located in 4 countries. Britain, France, Belgium and The Netherlands. The main link is from London to Paris but before we talk about the routes, stations and all other things, let's talk about who created the link and when it first opened. The tunnel between the English Channel first got to work in 1974 but got aborted and was restarted in 1986. It was in planning for two years until it started construction in 1988. The tunnel took a long time to finish and finished in 1993. How It StartedThe tunnel wasn't touched by trains for a year and the first service was on the 14th of November 1994 and it ran from London Waterloo International Station to Paris Gare du Nord in France and to Brussels in Belgium. In 1995, Eurostar trains were going as high as 171.5 km/h and in 1996 a second station, Ashford International opened. This meant that people could come from 2 different stations in London. In 2007, people now came from London St Pancras instead of Waterloo because they needed to refurbish the station. Not many things were done after that. Now let's look at the records. The English Channel tunnel has the longest bit of underwater track. In Britain, a Eurostar train went 334 km/h and that was the fastest in all of Britain. Regional FranceThe train from London can take 3 turns. One to Paris, one to Belgium and the Netherlands and one to regional France. They go through Disneyland and at Lyon station, the train can turn to go to Marseille or Bourg-St-Maurice where the train finally terminates. The full service takes 7 hours and 51 minutes. The line opened at the same time as all the other routes and is the route that has the least amount of records and milestones so many people don't acknowledge this route. It is also the least used past Disneyland. I also love that Disneyland gets its own station! The Rest of ItThere isn't much after that except for Belgium and the Netherlands. What I love about the Eurostar is that everything starts in London and then the train takes a route to either Paris, France or Belgium and the Netherlands. Belgium has the station Brussels and Antwerp and the London train turns after Lille station. It goes past the Belgium-Netherlands border and arrives in Rotterdam and then Amsterdam where it goes back to London and starts the route again. The CostsI'm going to save you the pain of looking online for tickets and do it myself so you can use the information. The price comes in a few different ways. The cheapest tickets from London to Paris are the earliest trains and latest trains between Tuesday and Friday. The standard ticket for the first, second and last route is 85 euros or $134. All other times are 102 euros or $161 one way. To go to Regional France, there are only 2 - 3 trains per day and each ticket is approximately 150 euros or $237. The last route is London to Amsterdam. Each ticket is around 100 euros to $170. The Eurostar also has different classes but for a 2 hour trip I don't think it's worth it. ImagesImage 1 is a map of the rail link, Image 2 is an image of the train, Image 3 is the Business Lounge you get access to if you have a Business Premier ticket and Image 4 is and image of the station, London St Pancras.
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AuthorI'd love to share my knowledge about trains with the world. Archives
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