The equation is known, old and complex. How to deal with the colossal needs of the aging of the French rail network after years of chronic lower investments, outside the TGV?
One thing is safe, the management of the SNCF has alerted the state for years in this problem, stirring the red touch of line closures or the deceleration in the speed of the trains.
At the time of TGV at 300 km/h, many other conventional trains (Interités and Ter) that represent 80% of the circulation, today take longer than in the past, while global traffic continues to progress.
After government ads that have never been followed by effects, such as the famous plan of 100 billion euros by 2040 for the promised railroad in February 2023 by Elisabeth Borne, the State finally decided to take the bull by the horns.
This is the theme of “Ambition France Transports”, a series of workshops aimed at resting the basic concepts of a sustainable, robust and sustainable public transport system until 2040, but without further eating state finances.
An observation that is cold on the back
This event is an opportunity for the SNCF to resume its Pilgrim’s Stick. Through a new report, the group has once again highlighted the condition of the 30,000 kilometers of the French rail network and the risks if we do nothing.
On average, the French rail network is 29 years old against 17 years in Germany, for example.
“If nothing is done, the SNCF warns, that is, if additional means is not dedicated to the maintenance of rails, ballast and especially to the catenaries, these copper wires that age that allow the locomotives to electricity, you can read 2,000 trains daily from 2028 for delay, unexpected work, even puncture closures,” you can read. “
In other words, 4,000 kilometers of lines are threatened by “a collapse of service quality” and even 10,000 kilometers in the years they will follow.
“We have in front of American Germany that has not made enough efforts and is experiencing great reliability problems,” said Jean-Pierre Farandou. Abroad, due to the lack of investments, “the regularity of trains fell to 60%,” he deplored.
What are the current investments in the network?
It is SNCF Réseau that is in charge of maintenance and maintenance of the network (tracks, catenaries, switches, signaling …)
This 100% entity of the SNCF group benefits from several sources of financing: the State and Europe, the tolls paid by the operators that take the tracks (including SNCF travelers) and a large part of the profits of the SNCF group (1.6 billion euros in 2024) reinjected in a competition fund.
In 2022, the yield contract for ten years between the State and the Réseau SNCF, the entity of the public company that was in charge of the deployment and maintenance of tracks and switches, provided 3 billion euros per infrastructure per year, compared to one billion before the 2018 reform.
What to finance 1,600 main sites in all territories to renew 1,064 km of tracks and regenerate or eliminate 492 switches (March 2024).
An insufficient sum denounced by unions, user associations and even the transport regulator and Senators
How much is needed to ensure the network at least?
Therefore, the calculation is quite simple: “It will be necessary to put 1.5 billion additional euros per year in the maintenance of the network since 2027,” adds who is about to abandon the group management.
This encryption was also validated by the Government in place in 2023, which indicated that it wanted to significantly review the financial trajectory of the contract between the State and the SNCF network for the 2021-2030 period. “
How to find money?
Problem, between these past statements and today, the context has changed well: inflation, war in Ukraine, mass increase in public debt and deficit and, therefore, budget austerity. The state funds are empty, you must find alternatives.
Especially because SNCF profits are not acting every year. “Regarding the coming years, it is too early to estimate its contributory capacity, which will depend on its results,” said the public company.
The operator can count on an unprecedented fashion for the train that results in an increase in its turnover. But at the same time, she must finance the purchase of New TGV And take the increase in its costs.
In these additional 1.5 billion necessary 2027, the SNCF says it is ready to put 500 million. But in reality, financing clues are quite numerous, political will is still necessary.
What ways for financing?
-Udu the price of tickets
It is the easiest but more sensitive lever. In recent years, the SNCF has proposed to make average increases in inflation. But customer’s feelings are different.
“I remind you that the TGV is not subsidized. It is important to cover our costs, but also finance our investments. The only solution to cover these investments is the price of our tickets,” said Alain Krakovitch, director of TGV/Interités last January.
-More contribute to SNCF competitors
Renfe, Trenitalia pays tolls in SNCF Réseau to circulate. These tolls in the most disputed lines such as Paris-Lyon are very high and can represent up to 40% of the price of a ticket. It would be a matter of further increasing those of the most profitable lines.
In return, SNCF Réseau could reduce those of deficit lines to encourage operators to position themselves (and, therefore, increase this source of financing).
It is still necessary that these actors attack these lines little or not profitable in deficit, which is not absolutely the case today. The State could force an operator that is launched in a TGV line to offer at the same time a good service in the territory (where the SNCF is the only one to operate) and finance the secondary network thanks to the tolls.
For unions, this would restore a certain balance because the SNCF pays the SNCF network twice: through the tolls of SNCF travelers and the reimbursement of their profits to the competition fund. For Sud Rail, for example, this situation is equivalent to competitive distortion.
-Pive in the unexpected gain of the road
This is one of the central subjects of “Ambition France Transports” because the concessions exploited by three large groups (Vinci, Eiffage and the Spanish Abertis) mature between 2031 and 2036. They generate around 13 billion euros instead per year.
“The State, I think, voluntarily deprived itself of a resource that was the true inheritance of the French and that could have sustainably abounded in the transport sector to find new investments, new funds,” said François Bayrou, prime minister.
“If there is an idea that I will express expressly, it is that the resources identified by the roads must be clearly argued towards the transport sector,” said Philippe Tabarot’s transport in mid -March.
-The carbon tax
Finally, Jean-Pierre Farandou has also mentioned several times the possibility of capturing part of the fiscal income extracted from the European Carbon Compensation System for air and road transport (STDs).
Source: BFM TV
