Reader Comments:

Views expressed in submitted comments are that of the author, and not necessarily shared by Railnews.

• Chris Gordon, Dereham

  (This comment was deleted by the moderators [Guidance Note 6]).

• Guy Tallier, Bryanston

  The Swiss are not screening the luggages of the trains going through the Loschberg tunnel (35 km) and do not intend to do it for the trains which will go to the Gotthard tunnel (50 km). It is the right time to rethink the security measures for the Channel Tunnel.

• Lorentz, London

  Ed: Yes you are correct, it is unlikely to attract Business travelers for the end to end journeys. It will be competing with Thalys services on part of the route and against whatever NS may offer. So for full length of the journey it is unlikely to have as high a margin as the Paris route which is likely to remain without future competition. Also if I recall correctly,part of the journey time estimate was dependent on raising the line speed on HS1. And yes,it looks to me that revelers will be the main beneficiaries of this service, provide the pricing remains low enough against coaches ad discount flights.

• Lutz, London

  At four hours or more, Eurostar may not be able to attract sufficient business/premium travellers, though it may help to fill the service gap between Brussels and Amsterdam.
  
  (But it won't be four hours from London for most business travellers who, I suggest, will want the Dutch business capital Rotterdam rather than Amsterdam, whose primary visitors are tourists. For them, a journey of maybe 3h45 coupled with suitably discounted fares is fine, while the premium passengers will have been dropped off 45mins/60mins earlier at Rotterdam. The service will use e320s, which have a slightly higher maximum speed than the present Eurostars, but they can already manage London-Brussels in just under two hours. The onward leg to Rotterdam by Thalys is currently 1h10. e320s might be able to shave that to the even hour.--Ed.)

• Nicole Wevers, London

  As a Dutch expat living in London this is fantastic news. Even better if the Deutsche Bahn service goes ahead too and makes a stop in the Netherlands en-route to Germany. Plus a bit of competition will hopefully keep the cost of the tickets down...

• Tony Pearce, Reading

  A further comment is that if we can (soon ?) get to Amsterdam and Koln (Cologne) by Eurostar/HS1 is there not an argument for getting the HS1 line joined to the East Coast and west Coast Main lines via a branch just north of Ebbsfleet International Station. Then trains from all UK major cities could have a direct service to the major important cities of Europe.

• Jase, Ashford

  Does anyone know if Eurostar will wash their shiny new E320's? Because they certainly don't bother with their current stock!

• Lee Worthington, Manchester

  Looking forward to using this new service. The relatively convenient connection (for me) between Euston and St.Pancras (compared to Waterloo station) and direct rail service to Amsterdam are long over due. Its a pity the regional Eurostar service never got beyond the planning stage even though the rolling stock was ordered. I have used the 'classic' intercity service between Brussels and Amsterdam and even though it is excelent in terms of punctuality the High Speed service could only improve the passenger experience.

• Paul Davis, Worcester

  I would have to say that this feels to me to be a nugget of good news! As I see it, this is another teensie bit of a big if unspoken social project (including DB and many others) to connect this place - England - with many other places that have hitherto been referred to as foreign. What will be fun, I think, will be the slowly increasing pressure coming from market-driven firms on one part of the UK government responsible for our non-Shengen borders.
  
  I do remember that the current closed border policy was itself the result of hysterical posturing by many politicians, as they responded in turn to histrionic press coverage that briefly inflamed an already parochial citizenry. It's lovely to see the railways contributing like this to a concerted challenge to social insularity. They always were a way of inculcating new relationships in society - common time zones and so on. Now, these stand in the vanguard of a pan-European ideal that some UK political parties would love to extinguish.

• Harjinder Singh, Southall

  I am disappointed that Eurostar is going to operate this service. I was hoping that Thalys trains and ICE trains would operate between London and Brussels, so that those of us who are over 5 feet can stretch our legs while travelling to Belgium !
  
  Harjinder Singh

• Jamie, Sheffield / Farnborough

  This is great news. I only wish Deutsche Bahn would pull their finger out a bit so Eurostar doesn't get a complete monopoly over all these new UK - Europe rail services.

• claydon william, Norwich Norfolk

  Just looking at the current Brussells timetable and likely train diagrams, it ought to be possible to run trains to/from Amsterdam without any increase in overall fleet size.
  
  Amsterdam service ought to have been part of the 'Eurostar' network from its inception, irrespective of the opening of the Belguim-Holland high speed line.
  
  Long overdue development IMO.
  
  (The present Eurostars cannot run between Brussels and Amsterdam for technical reasons. The new service will be provided by e320s.--Editor)

• Michael, London

  I personally Look Forward to the day I can take a 'sleeper service' from London to Beijing in less than 48 hours, with unlimited stops en-route for day, weekend: city breaks. A week at lake Baikal, en route, is one of the stops I am look most forward to.

• MikeB, Liverpool

  Good news but we must hope that the Home Office does not throw a spanner in the works by insisting that passport and ticket checks must be established at Antwerp, Schiphol Airport and Amsterdam. The surly attitude of UK Border Agency staff, as experienced by passengers at Brussels, may very well deter people from using what could be an excellent service.

• Peter Davidson, Alderley Edge, NW.England

  Tony Pearce, Reading: "If anyone wants to see how to cock-up a new High-Speed service this is the one to study"
  
  Indeed and if memory serves correct the procurement policy for that rolling stock (FYRA) was driven in part by parochial political sentiment, ie. it must be sourced from a Holland based manufacturer - the rolling stock in question is now subject to a (doubtless protracted) legal dispute?
  
  So the moral of this tale is; resist clarion calls to buy [insert nation state here] just for the sake of it - and conduct an unbiased, object assessement of the best overall package on offer?
  
  The point I'm making here is that prevalent among much of the (often hysterical) debate surrounding HS2 are strident demands that procurement MUST be biased towards local (BRITISH) sources - the evidence provided by FYRA is that might not be such a good idea after all?

• Chris Neville-Smith, Durham

  Also, I believe the Fyra trains ran a slower service than the Thalys trains. Result? Everyone going to Brussels went on the faster Thalys services instead. On the Breda line, where this is no competition from Thalys services, the service kept going. Moral? Passengers think speed does matter. Blaming the high-speed line for duff trains is like blaming the M1 for the Ford Pinto.
  
  Going back to the the service, we really do need to make up our minds on how to handle passport controls on an expanded network. Probably the first thing to decide is if we still need baggage screening. Most international trains don't use this, but most Spanish AVEs screen baggage, even on domestic services. If we decide to carry on doing this, you have to do it at embarkation. Screening for bombs on the train is impossible, screening at the end of the journey is stupid for the obvious reason.
  
  However, whatever we do with the baggage screening, I'm minded to suggest we should move UK passport controls to St. Pancras for all non-Paris/Brussels services. I don't think that would be too hard - you would simply need to make sure that all passengers disembarking from these trains are funnelled through to an exit with a manned border control. I've seen them do this before, at the height of the Lille loophole problem, and it worked. Annoying that we had to do passport controls twice due to lack of co-operation from Belgian authorities, but if this replaces passport controls at the other end, that should mean you only have to do it once.

• Melvyn Windebank, Canvey Island, Essex

  How ironic that this announcement comes just as London Mayor Boris Johnson calls for cutbacks to HS2 believing there will be no market foe European services north of London !
  
  We all know the problems are more to do with politicians unwilling to sign up to Schengen Agreement something that seem odd given we are still an island although I suppose that's why this problem persists.
  
  This news comes on top of plans for DB to start services to London and perhaps given how Eurostar trains have been used on ECML in the past the question arises as to whether we should have followed the French example and built a High Speed link between Stratford International and ECML first ?
  
  This news also means there must be a better link between HS1 and HS2 than the North London Line proposal given growth of London Overground and freight services on North London Line.

• John Leeming, Walthamstow

  I wonder if everyone will have to pile off the train with their luggage at Brussels on the return journey, to go through security and immigration?

• Tony Pearce, Reading

  The line between Belgium and the Netherlands has been the subject of a complete disaster with the new high-speed Italian trains just now stuck in a siding probably never to be used. If anyone wants to see how to cock-up a new High-Speed service this is the one to study. However will all the problems now also effect the Eurostar service planned to be running on the same route(s) ?
  
  (No reason to think so. The problems concerned a particular build of train, not the line itself. Thalys sets use the route every day, and have done so for some years now.--Editor)