Ok.
I guess many on this forum would like to ride again in the classic couchette. I wonder if this was a pilgrim thing
) ?
A quick search indicates that I had wrongly imagined that SNCF was reintroducing their night trains which they stopped running except for the very popular Toulouse - Paris route (that I caught on my way to Germany after finishing a Camino at Sanguesa [because the bus went at the right time] ).
It appears the classic Couchette night trains will not be coming back, so us traditionalists will be disappointed, but a private company is proposing a more upmarket service across Europe.
hmmmm, as far as I know, both of those types of night train will be part of the mix -- and there were more of them left than just the Paris-Toulouse, though not very many.
There's a Paris-Albi ; a Luxembourg/Strasbourg-Cerbere (though it used to carry on to Portbou) ; the Paris-Irún was never officially suppressed, though this news details what's becoming of it ; the Paris-Luchon is in a similar limbo that Paris-Irún was, but officially it still "exists" ; the Blue Train stopped going to Ventimiglia in 2010, ending at Nice instead, and was closed between 2017 and 2021 ; Paris-Briançon ; Paris-Latour de Carol (via Andorra) ; and the Paris-Toulouse still has a few carriages that carry on to Portbou via Carcassonne and Perpignan, and the stop at Narbonne is being re-established in December.
One major difference between the old night trains and the current ones is that there are no train stops between midnight and 5AM. So you couldn't use the current Blue Train as a night train to Avignon, for example.
The closed line that annoys me the most personally, Camino-wise, is the Nice-Irún ; though no more Paris-Ventimiglia is also irksome for different reasons. There were also a Venice-Bordeaux, and a Rome-Portbou.
My memory (perhaps a rail fan can provide a link) is that SNCF upgraded their fleet and built 3,000 carriages including the couchette style (just before the TGV was approved) which then became redundant as the TGV was introduced. And these 3,000 pre-TGV carriages can go 200 km/h and the electric locomotives that haul them much faster.
This is exactly the fleet of train carriages that's being renovated and put back into service for this revival, initially at least -- though most of the older Corail-style carriages that you may remember have been sold or broken apart ; some though are still in, or being returned to service. The future projected lines and line revivals will require some new rolling stock.
As to the "luxury" night trains you mention, this will be something separate to the night trains as such, rather than replacing them, and will be a service of
wagons-lits rather than couchettes and reclining seats, and IIRC international not just French territorial.
