Travellers are favouring rail over air when it comes to moving between London and Paris, chief executive of London's record-breaking high-speed Eurostar network Richard Brown says.
Since sales for the new Eurostar High Speed 1 service went on sale on July 24, more than 110,000 tickets have been sold, with a marked increase in business-class seats.
"More and more travellers are realising that going by Eurostar avoids airport delays, fuel surcharge, waiting for baggage and time spent getting to and from out-of-town airports," Brown says.
High Speed 1 yesterday achieved a record breaking time for travelling between the two capitals – it reached St Pancras from Paris' Gare du Nord station in two hours and three minutes – 20 minutes faster than journeys travelling to London's Waterloo Station.
Speeds of up to 200mph were recorded.
"[We have] proved that our 186mph trains are by far the quickest way of travelling between France and Britain," Brown says.
Journeys on High Speed 1 from St Pancras will start operating on November 14 this year.
To compliment its European operations the company will also run out of Ebbsfleet International near Kent, opening up the southern part of the UK to Eurostar services. Other cities could eventually be included according to newspaper reports .
Reported by Penny Jones
