A new delay of more than three hours occurred on Sunday on the Paris-Clermont line, two days after the arrival of a delegation to Clermont-Ferrand and the announcement of measures to improve traffic, notoriously struggling on this link.
Leaving Paris shortly before 7 p.m. on Saturday, the 247 passengers on board intercity train 5983 arrived in Clermont-Ferrand shortly after two a.m. on Sunday after a journey twice as long as expected, said SNCF, confirming information from the regional daily
La Montagne
.
To compensate for a
“malfunction”
on the train, the SNCF dispatched another at night to Nevers, the main stage of the journey between Paris and the Auvergne capital, and also announced that travelers
“will benefit from a reimbursement of up to 150 %”
of the ticket price.
A delay of more than three hours occurs every two weeks on this line (used by 1.8 million users in 2023) and a delay of more than an hour on average twice a week, the Minister of Transport denounced on Friday. the Ecological Transition Christophe Béchu, describing an
“unbearable”
situation .
Visiting Clermont-Ferrand with two other ministers and in particular the boss of the SNCF Jean-Pierre Farandou, he announced the establishment of a system consisting, from the end of March, of adding locomotives, protecting the tracks and improving crisis management.
The visit of the ministerial delegation followed a major incident which, at the end of January, plunged 700 passengers into a night of hardship on this Intercités line, one of the least reliable on the network.
Read alsoParis-Clermont line: how the SNCF and the government want to limit the countless delays