Lille’s Eurostar passenger departure lounge is to benefit from a €3 million makeover to accomodate the growing number of international passengers visiting the city.
Work will begin in March to increase the size of current departure lounge by 120 sqm and create a ‘better flow of passage’ for passengers.
Lille is the only provincial French city to directly connect four European capitals and by 2030 Eurostar estimates that passenger numbers will increase by more than 30 per cent.
Gares & Connexions, the body which manages stations on the French national rail network, has said that normal services will run throughout the work, which is expected to be completed by November 2014.
From the train, Lille Europe station looks a soulless sight of dull concrete and darkness.There is very little life on the platforms, just a few people waiting to catch the one train in the platform. And it is a long walk to Lille Flandres if you wish to make a connection. Whilst the walk might be quite pleasant on a warm summer’s day. it could be rather unpleasant and a serious barrier to onward travel to people carrying large suitcases, elderly pepole not as mobile as they once were, mothers with young children. It would not be pleasant in cold weather with snow and ice on the streets, or in heavy rain, or even on a very hot summer’s day with temperatures in the 80s or 90s.
No take a look at Antwerp, not so many kilometres away. Surely the answer is to divert the high speed line so that it passes directly under Lille Flandres with an easy weather-free access between platforms. This may sound costly, but is a good example of how to achieve best practice and grow the passengers numbers upwards.
In the picture, the environment looks a lot better than on the platform, but it still seems to resemble our local cattle market.
Please think carefully about how you make the passenger experience of traveling by train a much more pleasant activity.
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