After 5 years of studies and 2 and a half years of work, the new forecourt of Avignon central station has just been inaugurated. A €20.25M project, more than 70% financed by local authorities, which completely reclassifies one of the main entrances to the city of the Popes by favoring green spaces and soft mobility.
The stakes were high for Avignon’s central station: an old lady in neo-classical style inaugurated in 1849 and whose last major developments dated back to the 1980s. A time when pride of place was given to automobile and its space-consuming parking.
“The station square did not necessarily offer a quality welcome, whether for SNCF or station users,” explains Cécile Helle, mayor of Avignon. It also did not capture the full extent of one of the main entrances to the city of Avignon, opposite the ramparts towards the Cours Jean-Jaurès then the Rue de la République. »
35% green spaces compared to 6% previously
“I was very quickly convinced that it was necessary to push back the parking spaces while promoting the greening of the site. We had to bring nature back into the city,” continues the mayor of the city of the Popes who “fought” so that as many existing trees as possible were preserved as part of this redevelopment. In all, 46 out of 52 trees will be preserved in this new space where nearly 150 trees and shrubs have also been planted. “It’s the project that adapted to the site’s wooded park and not the other way around,” insists Cécile Helle. A reinterpretation of the city entrance which allows the site to now have 35% green spaces compared to 6% before the construction site as well as fountains and water features.
7,400 passengers and 120 trains per day
But before being a ‘parvis-garden’ of almost 13,000m2, this space was reclassified for an amount of €20.25M (financed by the City of Avignon, Grand Avignon, the South Region, SNCF Gares & Connexions, the State, the ERDF and other subsidies as well as by the Water Agency: see details below) is above all a PEM: a Pole multimodal exchange welcoming nearly 7,400 travelers and 120 trains every day.
A station notably served by 4 ‘TER Zou!’ lines from the South Region as well as TERs from the Occitanie and Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes regions. The TGV Inoui of the Paris-Miramas line stops there.
Apart from the train, the station is also connected to the Orizo public transport network in Greater Avignon by tram and several bus lines. Located in the immediate vicinity, the bus station finally completes this offer with regional and interregional service by coach.
“With these new developments, we are offering public transport users easier travel conditions and renewed urban quality. »
Joël Guin, president of Grand Avignon
“Grand Avignon spans an urban area of more than 500,000 inhabitants and welcomes more than 30,000 businesses and 90,000 jobs within its own territory,” recalls Joël Guin, president of the Greater Avignon Urban Community. Within this rapidly developing territory, travel needs are increasing and becoming more complex. One of the keys to the efficiency of public transport lies in intermodality and the ease that users can have in switching from one mode of travel to another. Intermodality is precisely what Grand Avignon brings to this new central station and which will contribute to ensuring its success, with the nearby bus station, the tram, the Vélopop, the bus… With these new developments, we offer public transport users easier travel conditions and renewed urban quality. »
“It was important that we all agree on the ambition we wanted to give to this project,” confirms the mayor of Avignon. In particular by the ambition to connect different modes of transport by repositioning the train at the heart of the system. Because our conviction is that the train is an alternative solution to everyday transport for the inhabitants of Avignon, but well beyond, for the inhabitants of the living area. »
“It is local elected officials who decide on the strategies, priorities, directions and means to be implemented. »
Bénédicte Martin, vice-president of the Provence Alpes Côte d’Azur Regional Council
Train stations: popular neighborhoods?
In his 9e barometer of the city center and businesses unveiled last April, the City Center on the Move network notes that 43% of residents of cities with 50,000 to 100,000 inhabitants (as is the case in Avignon) are in favor of rehabilitation station areas. At the same time, 49% consider it to be part of the city center. Station areas primarily occupied by young people (under 35) and CSP+.
“This inauguration is also a demonstration that our territories are moving forward,” notes Vaucluse resident Bénédicte Martin, vice-president of the Provence Alpes Côte d’Azur Regional Council. And they are moving forward because there are local elected officials who decide. »
“It is local elected officials who decide on the strategies, priorities, directions, and means to be implemented,” she insists. And here, these elected officials know how to work together. »
“It goes to show that there can be useful public spending, even when it is carried out by local authorities,” remarks Cécile Helle, referring to the State’s growing mistrust of local authorities.
Transport: one of the Region’s primary skills
While the ‘Transport’ skill is one of the most important in the South Region with High Schools, Bénédicte Martin recalls that despite the current context, the Region will continue “to increase the transport offer everywhere: +32% between 2022 and 2025 and +16% for the year 2025”.
“Expanding rail services,” continues the regional elected official, “this is what was done with Avignon via Marseille and Avignon-Marseille via Cavaillon. That is 13 more trains per day in 2025 to offer a total of 74 TER daily between Avignon and Marseille. It is also Avignon-Carpentras, with 8 additional trains per day and an experiment in 2024 which was carried out to increase the schedule of the shuttles throughout the duration of the Avignon Festival. »
Grand Avignon: moving forward on mobility
The inauguration of the forecourt of Avignon central station allowed Joël Guin, the president of Greater Avignon, to recall the agglomeration’s next projects in terms of mobility.
“We will now be able to initiate a second phase in the development of major strategic projects, currently under study. » New dedicated Chron’hop lines, extension of the tramway, new relay parking lots, creation of an Express Bike Network so that residents can travel quickly by bike on dedicated routes between the municipalities of Greater Avignon…
“The projects have been launched, in all alternative modes of travel to the car”, confirms the president of the agglomeration who also recalls that the “renewal of the bus fleet of our Orizo network, started 3 years ago now, mobilizes very heavy investments in Greater Avignon. »
The agglomeration, which is also continuing its policy in favor of electric, hybrid and even hydrogen, has also renewed its Vélopop self-service electric bicycle offer and has developed 42 kilometers of cycle lanes in the various municipalities of the agglomeration.
“The prices of our bus network are among the lowest in France,” concludes Joël Guin. This year, it transported – with the tram – nearly 15 million passengers. This is a record, with an increase of almost 40% in 3 years. »
Photo credit: Grand Avignon/Orizo
Avignon believes in its (rail) star
While development work on the east wing of the station is still in progress and a final phase of beautification work on the upper forecourt of the pedestrian link which provides access to the bus station as well as the car park and the station drop-off remains to be carried out in 2025, what is the next step?
“With the new Avignon Center multimodal station, we are continuing the modernization of regional transport and we are prefiguring the future Avignon regional express service (SERM), ” already announces Renaud Muselier, president of the South Region.
Indeed, the territory of the Avignon living area is among the 9 new SERM projects certified last summer by the Ministry of Transport. The only one not to be located in a metropolis.
It must be said that after this redevelopment, which also includes the requalification of 2,000 m2 of interior space on the ground floor (Zou! sales point, press area, new public toilets, shops, waiting areas, etc.) , the central station aims to fully regain its place at the heart of the railway star of Avignon (editor’s note: this is how we name, because of its shape, the entire rail network which serves the city popes).
A railway star which constitutes “the most regular sector in the region with, since the start of the year, a regularity greater than 92% and only 1.2% reduction”, announces Bénédicte Martin.
“You have to make people want to travel. »
Eliane Barbosa, Executive Director of Regional and Parisian Stations at SNCF gares & Connexions
“This is only a stage because there are not many urban areas across France that have such a density of existing railway lines,” Cécile Helle has already announced. We are therefore very attached to seeing the Serm develop because I remain convinced that when we live in the sectors of Carpentras-Monteux, Bollène-Orange, Isle-sur-la-Sorgue/Le Thor but also the Rhone Gard with Bagnols-sur-Cèze and Pont-Saint-Esprit, Beaucaire-Tarascon or even the North of Bouches-du-Rhône, this railway star is a real asset in terms of mobility. »
As proof, even the Occitanie region, although reluctant to invest in its eastern confines, has fully played the rail mobility card between the Rhone Gard and Avignon by reopening a TER line to Pont-Saint-Esprit since the summer of 2022 .
On the northern Bouches-du-Rhône side, the noted presence at this inauguration of Jean-Christophe Daudet, the mayor of Barbentane, a fervent supporter of the reopening of his town’s station, also shows the interest in the revitalization of this railway star.
“The train and alternative modes of transport must take precedence over the automobile,” insists Bénédicte Martin. With ease of timing and density, only under this condition can we achieve these objectives. »
“You have to make people want to travel,” summarizes Eliane Barbosa, Executive Director of Regional and Parisian Stations at SNCF gares & Connexions.
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