SNCF: the Paris-Lyon TGV line will be closed for four days for work from November 9 to 12

Europe 1 with AFP 11:23 a.m., February 29, 2024, modified at 11:27 a.m., February 29, 2024

The Paris-Lyon TGV line, the busiest in Europe, will be closed for four days between Saturday November 9 and Tuesday November 12 inclusive, to prepare for the commissioning of a new signaling system, SNCF Réseau said on Thursday.

The work aims to equip the line with the ERTMS signaling system, a European standard, which should improve the regularity and reliability of trains but also increase the capacity of the line by 25% by 2030.

The line represents a third of high-speed traffic

ERTMS is a pan-European signaling system, which is intended to gradually replace national systems.

It must, among other things, facilitate “the interoperability of the different European networks”, according to SNCF Réseau.

“An operation of this scale is a world first on a high-speed line in operation,” the company said in its press release.

Work to install this new system began five years ago, without interruption of traffic until now.

The Paris-Lyon TGV line, commissioned in 1981 and 460 km long, sees a third of high-speed rail traffic in France.

With ERTMS, the frequency will be able to increase from 13 trains to 16 trains per hour and per direction.

The total amount of the operation represents 820 million euros, financed both by SNCF Réseau (700 million) and by the European Commission (120 million).

When the work was launched, the bill was estimated at 608 million euros and the end of the project in 2025.

1,000 people mobilized

“Railway companies currently using the line will be able to continue to operate there without technical modifications to their rolling stock,” said the infrastructure manager.

And companies will thus be able to have additional passage slots on a line already operated at maximum capacity, “without new infrastructure”.

The project includes several components: the modernization of the signal stations, a single command center in a “control tower” of the line and the increase in electrical power.

The closure of the line for four days, which will mobilize "1,000 people for 101 hours continuously", aims to "commission the new supervision center".

Throughout the duration of the closure, the transport plan will be adapted with a reduction in the number of trains using the Paris-Lyon axis and “a significant increase in travel time via the classic line”, warns SNCF Réseau.