a project that will make a splash?

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With Navigône, the future service of shuttles on the Saône in Lyon planned for June 2025, TCL users will be able to cross the city by water. Users will be able to connect Confluence to Vaise in 35 minutes with four stops in total.

For Etienne Faugier, lecturer in contemporary history at Lyon 2 University and specialist in the history of mobility, this service could go further to attract as many people as possible.

A service included in the TCL offer

In the past, many boats used the Rhône and Saône between the beaches and the quays of Lyon. Invented in Lyon, the riverboats left the city's waterways in 1913.

Bruno Bernard, president of the Métropole de Lyon and Sytral, intends to reconnect with this past with Navigône. Able to accommodate 70 passengers with 50 seats, two thermal shuttles will circulate on the Saône in June 2025. There will be four from October 2025, then replaced entirely by electric boats from April 2026.

But really attractive?

Running every day of the week (excluding floods) from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m., the shuttles will pass every 15 minutes during rush hour. Greater Lyon is betting on 560,000 travelers per year for an annual operating cost estimated at 4.2 million euros.

Etienne Faugier is critical: “It makes me wonder about all the means implemented for a project that has no basis in requests. One wonders how many Lyonnais will use this on a daily basis. Creating supply allows you to gauge demand, but the risk is to close the project in two years. »

A project to take further?

The president of Sytral seems to be aware of this: “This file was very complicated to put together. Many promised it, many dreamed of it, we are doing it. The challenge is to offer our subscribers travel a little leisure and nice. It’s also a way of thanking them,” he argues. But the idea seems under-exploited.

“If it works, connect Trévoux to Lyon and Vienne with an attractive price could relieve congestion on the TER and provide a service to many users”, analyzes the specialist who even dares to go further: “It is done in Canada over long distances, why not imagine that it is done on the axis from Lyon to Marseille, in addition to the motorway and the TGV? In the south-north direction, it is not said that we save time. »

Indeed, if the ride can be worth the detour in summer or during a weekend of good weather by offering a privileged view of the city, the service is far from having the prerogative of a strong line.

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