Last August, I took the train from Trieste to Ljubljana, following a route once used by the Orient Express. Along the way, I admired the Adriatic coast, discovered that Prosecco is a now abandoned railway station dating from 1857, and felt the shift in geography as the train climbed towards Villa Opicina on the Italian-Slovenian border. Crossing into Slovenia now means little more than a change of crew.
I had with me Alma, a novel by Federica Manzon set in Trieste and the former Yugoslavia that explores the region’s strong and complicated connections, frozen by the cold war and rattled by the Balkan wars. As the train crossed into Slovenia, I thought about the shared history and geography of two places that were kept apart for decades.
The trip cost about €12 and took just over two and a half hours. It was not high-speed rail, but a small Austrian train with a few carriages where you had to bring your own food (a good opportunity for a picnic with Trieste’s food delicacies). Still, it was joyful. That is the case for many train journeys around Europe, an increasingly popular way of rediscovering space and history in a less stressful, less polluting and more convenient way – and not just for leisure.
Trains take you to places you might otherwise bypass. Between Barcelona and London, I enjoyed Nîmes, whose tree-lined avenue leading from the station offers a model of a welcoming arrival experience, and rediscovered Sète, Paul Valéry’s often overlooked seaside town, now revamped for cyclists and pedestrians. Exploring the almost perfect Swiss rail network, I stumbled on one of the best outdoor swimming spots I’ve ever been to: a public pool by Lake Thun, just one stop from Berne. In recent months, I have even enjoyed a smooth Brussels to Berlin train trip that was only a few minutes late, in contrast with the frequent delays that German passengers complain about.
Flying does not save much time for certain trips in Europe when you factor in security lines and delays. And train travel is obviously much more sustainable as reducing emissions from aviation and road transport remains a constant challenge. As a means of transport, trains have the lightest carbon footprint: taking a train instead of a car for medium-length distances reduces emissions by about 80%, and taking a train instead of a domestic flight cuts them by 86%, according to the climate and data researcher Hannah Ritchie.
In 2023, the last year with full data available, European trains were popular again, recovering from the pandemic’s effect, with a record 429bn passenger-kilometres (the number of rail passengers multiplied by the kilometres travelled). About 8 billion railway journeys were made in the EU, with the highest increases in Croatia, Luxembourg, Ireland, Spain, Italy and Slovenia compared with the previous year.
Rail passenger numbers are expected to reach record highs in 2025 as routes keep expanding. The new year brings fresh connections between Paris and Berlin, Barcelona and Toulouse, Amsterdam and London and Budapest and Kyiv, according to the Man in Seat 61, Mark Smith, arguably the best source for train news in Europe. Smith is a former employee of British Rail who, from his Buckinghamshire village, provides the most reliable information on connections, timetables, trains and routes – a reflection of the lack of comprehensive, integrated platforms for European rail travel.
As Smith says, travelling by train throughout mainland Europe, even from the UK, is a much more practical option than most people imagine. But finding out about it can be frustratingly difficult. Exceptions such as ÖBB Scotty, the Austrian railways app, show what is possible, but there’s still much work to be done.
Competition has also driven down prices on some routes, particularly in Spain, Sweden, Austria and France. The UK is still an outlier, with the highest rail fares in Europe and often unreliable services. Any continental trip from the UK has the additional price tag of Eurostar, even more expensive and time-consuming since Brexit.
Cross-border rail connections are still slower than they should be and collaboration between countries is fraught with disputes: for instance, the Spanish and French governments are blaming each other for delays on the Madrid-Paris lines.
The European commission is investing billions of euros in expanding high-speed rail connections, aiming to double their use by the end of this decade. A new, better-integrated European rail traffic system is planned to phase out the current patchwork of national ones. However, connections to local trains have often been neglected in favour of high-speed rail. That needs to be improved.
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If trains are to compete with low-cost, often subsidised, flights, affordability also has to be addressed. Services need to be far more competitive for families, and not just in price. Swiss trains, for instance, make an effort to welcome children with colourful and spacious carriages, but such accommodations are rare elsewhere.
Governments must also continue to invest in basic infrastructure, with support from EU funds, to prevent systems from becoming obsolete. Track maintenance may not have the same glamour for politicians as inaugurating high-speed trains, but it’s the backbone of a reliable service, as underfunded systems such as Britain’s painfully show.
There is much to look forward to if you love trains as I do. I can’t wait for the planned Frecciarossa connecting Milan and Ljubljana, a high-speed project involving Trenitalia and the Slovenian railways. I would still not skip the stop in Trieste.
