The famous early produce train made its last departure this week for the Rungis market before a forced shutdown for at least a year. Since 1986, the connection has been restarted several times. This time, the freight cars may never return to the rails.
He was to leave for the last time today, Friday June 28. The train of new products finally remained at the platform. Uhe final blow for this historic freight line which links Perpignan to Rungis. She could well disappear.
“The train can run! There are drivers, training agents. The fruits and vegetables are nearby. Now, a political decision is needed. We will not give upexplains Mikaël Meusnier,
CGT railway workers general secretary in Perpignan. LIle-de-France residents eat fruits and vegetables as much as they are vegetables from Roussillon. LThe train is one and a half times cheaper than the cost of transport by truck.”
The new produce train is at the dock waiting for a buyer.
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© Alain Sabatier / FTV
The SNCF must sell this line to the competition but for the moment, there is no buyer. One of the reasons : it has not been profitable for years. Only four of the 14 wagons are filled when leaving the Saint-Charles market.
Fruit and vegetable exporters prefer road transport. A transport company justifies this choice: “LThe slightest delay will cause us to postpone a delivery. We are required by our customers to deliver at specific times. Then there are the strike issues, we cannot deny that. UA delivery delayed by 24 hours may result in the total loss of goods.“SNCF today is not necessarily reliable.”
In 38 years of service, this is not the first time that the primeur train has been threatened. Jean Castex, the Prime Minister, had relaunched the line in 2021, after two years of shutdown. So today, can we still save this historic freight?
“A train is a mode of transport that is said to be combined. We reduce the number of kilometers traveled by truck to do the maximum by train. We could both load vegetables and fruits, but also equipment, car parts, anything that could be useful to the industry in order to try to overcome this impasse.suggests Guillaume Carrouet, transport researcher at the University of Perpignan.
If we take the flexible and price criteria, the truck wins by a wide margin.
Guillaume CarrouetTransport researcher at the University of Perpignan
The train must stop for a year due to work at Rungis. If it started again, the filled wagons would avoid 20,000 trucks on the roads each year. Many fear that we are heading towards a first-class funeral.
