A little over 35 years after its official opening by the then president, Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, on 12 April 1975, Lyon Saint-Exupéry airport is finally going to get a modern, fast rail link with the city. The Rhônexpress tram will be inaugurated on 19 July – operational from 9 August – and will be France’s first dedicated airport rail link. The project has cost 120 million euros, of which over half come from loans to Rhônexpress (Caisse des Dépôts, Veolia Transport, Vinci), the contractor chosen by the Conseil Général du Rhône.
The 22 km journey will take exactly 27 minutes, reaching its highest speed of 100 km/h over the final seven kilometers of track from the Meyzieu ZI stop, where the T3 (ex -Léa) tramway terminates and which is the route followed by the new Rhônexpress service. Passengers will need to add a further nine minutes to their journey for the walk between tram and the airport’s Terminal 3 and seven minutes to get to Terminals 1 and 2.
“We’ll start out with six 76-seater trains when we open, and Rhônexpress has plans to buy a further five trains should there be a need,” explains Luc Borgna, director of the operating company. “The service will operate daily from 5 am to midnight, with trains running every 15 minutes between 6 am and 9 pm and every 30 minutes the rest of the time. Should a flight arrive later than midnight we guarantee to keep the service running to enable passengers to get into the city”.
From its opening date, RhĂ´nexpress will replace the road link currently operated by Satobus, which carries 835,000 passengers a year.
This ultra-modern form of transport will undoubtedly prove to be an added bonus for anyone wanting to get into the city centre, especially at peak hours. Rhônexpress is also expected to benefit the development of business tourism. The two-stop line (Carré de Soie and Meyzieu ZI) will cost passengers13 € for a single ticket or 66 € for a book of six tickets (working out at 11 € per trip).
The inauguration of the line was preceded by a three day “open house” event at the Part-Dieu terminus on 8, 9 and 10 July, enabling Lyon residents to see for themselves the new transport link which had been on the wish list of the airport’s regular users for decades.
RhĂ´nexpress
