- “Do you work for SNCF?”
I work for a Swiss railway company where I do passenger information. I have no connections with SNCF or any other transport company operating in France.
The LGV timetable is a purely private project. - “Why all this? Isn’t there timetable information on the Internet?”
I refer once again to my somewhat ironic, but quite serious sentence in the foreword: “Electronic timetable information with point-to-point connections from a worm’s-eye view can never replace the warming overview of a timetable table.” For the majority of travellers, a point-to-point information from electronic journey planners is sufficient. But as a person interested in railways and transport, however, I also want to get an overview of the entire range of services on specific routes. Schedule tables provide a great overview and comparison about…
> which trains are travelling on which route
> how often and how many trains are running
> on which days a train is operating
(relevant, for example, for seasonal trains or trains that only run on certain days; there is still no way to display such information within the most journey planners)
On routes with few, possibly not even through trains, journey planners may send me on different ways from the outset. But if I explicitly want to travel via a particular route, I have to handle it by guessing suitable “via” stations, (usually date-related) departure boards and so on. In a schedule timetable, on the other hand, all the travel options summarised compactly are given to me at a glance.
In the case of France, it is also possible to include trains from competing providers (e.g. Trenitalia, Renfe) or low-cost offers (OUIGO), which otherwise often have to be looked up separately on each provider’s website. As a track collector, I keep travelling all over Europe. Timetable tables (where available) are always a great planning aid for me in order to be able to cover as many routes as possible. For regional transport in France, “Fiches Horaires” are still available on the regional TER websites. However, an overview for long-distance transport, especially for high-speed routes, has not existed for several years. At the same time, more and more low-cost offers or new operators are showing up. All those often provide their information only on their own websites. Since there is no longer a general, tabular overview of French HSR services, I have now set about doing this myself. The “European Rail Timetable” (ERT), which is compiled and published monthly or quarterly by a great group of British timetable specialists, also serves as a model for me here. While the ERT mostly depicts the connections between the individual centres, I want to focus on the individual LGV routes themselves and depict the traffic there with all its connecting branches, intermediate stops and – where feasible with reasonable effort – train overhauls. - “Are you French or German?”
I am an Austrian living in Switzerland who speaks passable French (written better than spoken), quite good English and Dutch, halfway Italian and a few chunks of many other languages (Spanish, Romanian, various Slavic and Scandinavian languages). Translations in this timetable are generally based on my own knowledge of foreign languages, partly supported and cross-checked by DeepL. 😉 - “The timetable information is out of date / deviates from the online information / is incorrect.”
Don’t believe anything what is written in my LGV Timetable under any circumstances. I have no idea if what it says represents the truth. ❗ 😜
Okay, some try of a neutral and factual answer: maintaining data on French train services is a Herculean task. The lack of regular timetables and intensive construction activities throughout the country make it impossible to publish a 100% binding timetable for the entire half timetable year in France. The times given are based on the timetable data available at the time of publication of the LGV Timetable. Most trains in France run according to a weekly recurring schedule, but there may be deviations from this, especially on public holidays. Departure and arrival times can also vary by several minutes over the timetable period (in the LGV sections to/from Paris rather than on the outer branches, where high-speed trains need to be integrated with existing mixed TER and freight services). In any case, the information from sncf-voyageurs.com, for example, should always be consulted for definitive journey planning. The latest timetable data is also available on the – in my opinion – more user-friendly SBB journey planner. DB, ÖBB or IDOS on the other hand, may contain less up-to-date data (usually up to 1 or 2 weeks behind). Attention: The SBB journey planner won’t show you OUIGO services. However, DB, ÖBB or IDOS now are showing these trains. Frecciarossa services operated by Trenitalia and the AVE trains operated by Spanish carrier Renfe can also be found in all the European journey planners mentioned above.
If you find any major errors, please let me know. These will be corrected in the next issue. A big thank you goes also to Claudio Schön (@claudsch@mastodon.social) for checking tables. - “Wouldn’t you rather differentiate the tables by destination to make them smaller and more readable? For example, a separate Paris to Marseille and Paris to Montpellier table?”
The tables should focus on the overall offer of the individual LGV routes including their connecting branches. The aim is also to visualise the general capacity utilisation and train sequence times to some extent. This is not always possible, for example in the case of train overhauls (LGV Est, LGV Nord) or when some of the trains are routed via classic lines running along the LGV routes (parts of LGV Méditerranée or LGV Atlantique). Nevertheless, I would like to show the bundled offer of all journeys on a route, even if the destinations of the trains running on it may sometimes be very varied. I have therefore dispensed with separate timetable lines for infrequently travelled destinations, which are then noted in the relevant journey column. Last but not least, each additional table also increases the effort required to add a train into this table.
For timetable tables sorted by destination, I recommend the printed or digital edition of the excellent European Rail Timetable. - “What software do you use for the tables?”
Just good, old-fashioned Microsoft Excel (Office 365) and lots of formulas and cross-links (e.g. for trains with different destinations or intersecteur services that run across several tables). These links between trains and footnotes make my manual work when editing and updating timetable data at least a little easier. Apart from that, everything still needs to be entered manually by myself. - “Where do you get your timetable information from?”
SNCF, Eurostar, AVE and Frecciarossa services can currently still be viewed easily using the old, but probably soon to be switched off edition of the ÖBB journey planner (“SCOTTY“). The offline information programs from the Czech company CHAPS (“IDOS” for Czechia, “ELIS” for Slovakia) are also a great help, as all train numbers in Europe can be displayed there in ascending order and without additional latency.
The greatest help at the moment, however, is a programme for evaluating GTFS data made by Florian Ellebrecht, with which I can go through all train numbers in an SNCF GTFS dataset one by one, compare them and enter their journey times in the tables. Thanks for your work, Florian. Highly appreciated!
Another good help, especially for determining/comparing traffic periods, is ÖBB’s “Timetable Booklet“.
Anyone else who has knowledge of Europe-wide timetable information or other GTFS applications of all kinds with date-independent display functions, please let me know! - “How long did it take you to do all this?”
I started the project in autumn 2019. I froze the project from spring 2020 to spring 2021 because no long-term reliable timetable data was available due to the pandemic. The construction of the timetable framework as well as adding and editing of all trains and their operating periods, the subsequent layout, needed a total of about a year of time. Experience has shown that I always need about a week to adjust all the tables for the semi-annual updates. In general, long-distance transport in France is fortunately only undergoing minor changes every year. The biggest work that needs to be done is adjusting seasonal trains to the ski areas or towards the sea.
Undoubtedly the most massive reduction in work would be a clock-face timetable (in German: “Taktfahrplan”), where the travel data could be entered once and then copied and linked into the neighboring columns with +30 / +60 / +120 minutes. Kind shout-out goes out to the SNCF timetable planning department. 😘 - “Will you create further timetables in the future?”
At some point I want to get started on a Renfe timetable. But at the moment I don’t have the leisure or time to do it. But “never say never”.
However, the LGV course book should be continued until further notice. - “Where can I find advice about updates?”
It is currently still a beta version of the LGV Timetable. The most recent version is always available here at http://www.gleisbaer.eu.
Starting with this edition, Gleisbär is also available on social media, currently on Mastodon, Bluesky & Instagram.
I’m also thinking about some kind of newsletter. Hopefully this will be made until next edition upcoming winter. - “May I distribute / spread your timetable?”
Provided you will use it for non-commercial purposes: Yes, of course! I would be happy to receive a brief note on where you can distribute the document. If you wish any kind of commercial use, please contact me at: gleisbaerATgleisbaer.eu - “How can I support you?”
The experience of the last years has shown me that a good week of time is needed each time to verify and update the timetable data. I am happy about any contribution to support and recognise my work a little bit, if you want and if you’re able to.
(Liberapay)