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Thalys Paris-Bruxelles-Amsterdam

Thalys was a brand name used for high-speed train services between Paris Gare du Nord,  Bruxellles and both Amsterdam Centraal and German cities in the Rhein-Ruhr. Prior to the creation of Thalys, an express rail service had long been operated between the capital cities of Paris and Brussels, the earliest being run in 1924 in the form of the train service l'Étoile du Nord. During 1987, the political decision to create a network of high-speed services between the cities of Paris, Brussels, Cologne, and Amsterdam was made in Brussels. However, in 1991, the Dutch parliament initially rejected the project; continued discussions led to an agreement being reached with Belgium for a route via Breda instead of Roosendaal. The building of the HSL-Zuid high speed line in the Netherlands was finally approved in 1996. Meanwhile, Germany decided against the construction of a new railway between Aachen and Cologne, instead opting to renovate the existing track between Duren and Cologne, which resulted in a top speed of 250 kilometres per hour along this section.  In 1995, Westrail International was created by the French and Belgian national railways to operate the new international services. That same month, both the logo and brand of Thalys were also created; the word deliberately lacked any particular meaning, save for being pronounceable in the languages of all the countries served. It was decided to procure Alstom-built TGV trains, similar to those already used by SNCF on the French national railways, as these were the only suitable rolling stock available at the time. Another key decision was to launch the service in advance of many of the planned high speed lines, being initially reliant upon slower conventional lines until these were eventually completed; the existing international services that used conventional rolling stock were deliberately withdrawn in preparation for the running of Thalys trains. In 1996, the first Thalys-branded train departed Paris, this maiden journey took two hours and seven minutes to reach to Brussels, and four hours and 47 minutes to arrive in Amsterdam. Initially, Thalys services only operated four times per day to Amsterdam and Cologne, while a far greater volume were run between Paris and Belgium. While quite restricted early on, the number of Thalys services would be gradually expanded over time, as would the high speed network that supported it. In 2020, a merger between Thalys and Eurostar International was confirmed. Upon the completion of the merger, it was intended for all of Thalys's services to be rebranded as Eurostar

February 15th 2025

 

 
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