Punctuality, connections slip slightly
Morges station, on the increasingly busy Lausanne-Geneva lineZURICH, SWITZERLAND – Swiss trains successfully wooed 1.6 percent more travelers during the first half of 2013, but as a result there was some slippage in trains arriving on time and connections made. The success rates was 87.3 percent for punctuality (down from 89.5 percent) and 97.5 percent, down from 98.3 percent, for connections made.
The recent increase in passsengers owes much to the revised rail schedule in French-speaking Switzerland, particularly on the Lausanne-Geneva line, but also between Lausanne and Valais, says the CFF.
But more rail maintenance, with some of it during passenger travel time, accounted for part of the lower success rate for running on time.
Most countries’ rail services would be happy to have the CFF Swiss rail track record for being on time and making connections but the Swiss are proud of their continuing record as the most used passenger train country in the world.
The number of passenger kilometres traveled rose in the first six months by 1.9 percent to nearly 18.73 billion, double what it was in 1980.