Historic agreement aims to ease train congestion

Vaud and Geneva instigated a major reorganisation of the train connections between Lausanne and Geneva airport by signing an agreement on Monday that allows them to move ahead without waiting for promised federal funds.

To create better travelling conditions for the 50,000 daily passengers and make way for a projected 50 per cent increase in railway traffic over the next ten years, the two cantons are putting 312 million Swiss francs on the table, two-thirds to be advanced by Vaud and one third by Geneva.

The funds will kick start a twenty-year expansion programme.

“Sixty per cent of the companies in the Lake Geneva region complain that their activities are hindered by the saturation of the means of communication,” says François Longchamp, president of the Geneva government, adding: “We cannot allow the situation to deteriorate further.”

Pascal Broulis, his opposite number in Vaud and one of four signatories of the agreement, is convinced that “mobility creates prosperity”. With a population of 1.8 million, including neighbouring France, Broulis claims that the region is the second economic pole in Switzerland and among the top ten in Europe.

“We need to sustain our dynamism and strength,” he maintains.

“Pre-financing by cantons especially in times of crisis is a very positive sign,” says Max Friedli, director of the Swiss federal office of transport who represents the Confederation in the negotiations. “From my point of view, the determination of these two cantons and the pre-financing scheme that they have proposed is exemplary.”

Friedli’s enthusiasm is shared by Andreas Meyer, the embattled director general of the Swiss national railway, also one of the signatories, and a man faced with dwindling funds and deteriorating trains.

“Today is an absolute first,” he declares. “The cantons of Vaud and Geneva are pioneers and I need to thank them. Their efforts will contribute to reducing the bottlenecks and saturation levels,” he says.

Between 2003 and 2008, passengers between Lausanne and Geneva increased by 40 per cent. According to Meyer: “the financial situation of the Confederation is in direct conflict with the need to develop the transportation infrastructure. What I really appreciate about the present initiative is that it responds to the needs of the passengers.”

The agreement signed on 21 December outlines the priorities. The immediate objective is to double the number of seated passengers by 2020. Bypasses must be created, trains and platforms must be lengthened, stations must be modernized and quays reassigned.

Ultimately interregional trains will run every 15 minutes, twice as often as they do today.

The total cost of transformations is estimated between two to three billion francs to be borne by the federal government once Vaud and Geneva have been reimbursed.

This puts cantons that cannot afford the initial outlay at a disadvantage observers note.

Longchamp refutes the argument by stating that an economically prosperous region benefits the entire country. “Proportionally we create the highest number of jobs in Europe.”

“We need to dare in order to prepare the future,” says Broulis, adding that for once the French-speaking part of Switzerland is the locomotive. He hints that a new form of governance, where cantons take the lead, may be the result of this agreement.