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IN IMAGES: The new high-speed Madrid to Barcelona train that costs just €9

The French-run Ouigo service will whisk passengers the 620 kilometres (385 miles) that separate Madrid from Barcelona in just two and half hours, with prices starting at €9. Here's a sneak peek at what this low-cost train looks like.

IN IMAGES: The new high-speed Madrid to Barcelona train that costs just €9
Photo: Ouigo/SNCF

French rail operator SNCF inaugurated a low-cost, high-speed rail service in Spain linking Madrid and second-city Barcelona on Friday.

The first Ouigo train left Madrid’s Atocha station for Barcelona at 10:15 am (0815 GMT) with invited guests on board.

Photo: Pierre Philippe Marcou/AFP

The commercial service started on Monday May 10th, the day after the pandemic state of emergency ended in Spain and people can move more freely between regions, with five daily return journeys between the two cities.

SNCF plans to launch similar services between Madrid and the eastern cities of Valencia and Alicante on the Mediterranean coast by the end of the year, and to the southern Andalusia region by 2022-23.

It will initially use four recently refurbished double-decker trains in Spain but plans to operate 14 trains in the country by 2023.

SNCF has invested €600 million ($722 million) in the Spanish operation despite posting huge losses in France because of the pandemic.

Spanish state rail operator Renfe, which until recently operated a monopoly in Spain, planned to launch its own low-cost, high-speed rail service dubbed Avlo last year to compete with Ouigo but the start of the service was delayed due to the pandemic. As the tweet exchange seen below suggests, both Renfe and Ouigo are up for the challenge. 

Ouigo’s launch in Spain thus marks the start of the liberalisation of the country’s railway service. 

Avlo is the cheaper cousin of Renfe’s popular high-speed service called AVE — which is Spanish for bird. It is scheduled to start on June 23rd with a service linking Madrid and Barcelona.

Italian rail operator Trenitalia and Spanish airline Air nostrum are due to launch a third budget bullet train service in Spain called Ilsa during the second half of 2022.

Spain’s high-speed rail network extends for 3,200 kilometres (2,000 miles), making it the second-longest in the world after China’s but it is known to be under-utilised.

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TRAVEL NEWS

German train strike wave to end following new labour agreement

Germany's Deutsche Bahn rail operator and the GDL train drivers' union have reached a deal in a wage dispute that has caused months of crippling strikes in the country, the union said.

German train strike wave to end following new labour agreement

“The German Train Drivers’ Union (GDL) and Deutsche Bahn have reached a wage agreement,” GDL said in a statement.

Further details will be announced in a press conference on Tuesday, the union said. A spokesman for Deutsche Bahn also confirmed that an agreement had been reached.

Train drivers have walked out six times since November, causing disruption for huge numbers of passengers.

The strikes have often lasted for several days and have also caused disruption to freight traffic, with the most recent walkout in mid-March.

In late January, rail traffic was paralysed for five days on the national network in one of the longest strikes in Deutsche Bahn’s history.

READ ALSO: Why are German train drivers launching more strike action?

Europe’s largest economy has faced industrial action for months as workers and management across multiple sectors wrestle over terms amid high inflation and weak business activity.

The strikes have exacerbated an already gloomy economic picture, with the German economy shrinking 0.3 percent across the whole of last year.

What we know about the new offer so far

Through the new agreement, there will be optional reduction of a work week to 36 hours at the start of 2027, 35.5 hours from 2028 and then 35 hours from 2029. For the last three stages, employees must notify their employer themselves if they wish to take advantage of the reduction steps.

However, they can also opt to work the same or more hours – up to 40 hours per week are possible in under the new “optional model”.

“One thing is clear: if you work more, you get more money,” said Deutsche Bahn spokesperson Martin Seiler. Accordingly, employees will receive 2.7 percent more pay for each additional or unchanged working hour.

According to Deutsche Bahn, other parts of the agreement included a pay increase of 420 per month in two stages, a tax and duty-free inflation adjustment bonus of 2,850 and a term of 26 months.

Growing pressure

Last year’s walkouts cost Deutsche Bahn some 200 million, according to estimates by the operator, which overall recorded a net loss for 2023 of 2.35 billion.

Germany has historically been among the countries in Europe where workers went on strike the least.

But since the end of 2022, the country has seen growing labour unrest, while real wages have fallen by four percent since the start of the war in Ukraine.

German airline Lufthansa is also locked in wage disputes with ground staff and cabin crew.

Several strikes have severely disrupted the group’s business in recent weeks and will weigh on first-quarter results, according to the group’s management.

Airport security staff have also staged several walkouts since January.

Some politicians have called for Germany to put in place rules to restrict critical infrastructure like rail transport from industrial action.

But Chancellor Olaf Scholz has rejected the calls, arguing that “the right to strike is written in the constitution… and that is a democratic right for which unions and workers have fought”.

The strikes have piled growing pressure on the coalition government between Scholz’s Social Democrats, the Greens and the pro-business FDP, which has scored dismally in recent opinion polls.

The far-right AfD has been enjoying a boost in popularity amid the unrest with elections in three key former East German states due to take place later this year.

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