I should look this up for details, but I seem to remember that there's a train route running parallel to the southern border that was abandoned for lack of demand. And there are some major cities there (Marseille, Montpellier, Toulouse) which aren't all that far apart.
Why do you think I was living there? Why is 1/5 and more of our population living there ?
It’s the economical center of the country. And it’s been design intentionally this way dating back to before the revolution.
It’s infuriating in many aspect. But it’s not relevant to the conversation of fly travel for distance under 3h in train. ( you can do Paris-Marseille in exactly 3h with fast train. It’s 80% of the nord-sud distance of the country. And it take 6h by car )
Since last year ( or the year before that) via the LGV to Bordeaux, Toulouse is at 4h and ~10minutes from Paris.
It was often plan kinda last minute.
I’m French and was living in Paris at the time.
Of course, for all abroad stuff beside london ( Eurostar ), the plane was preferred.
But for national travel, only one city was too far to reach with a early morning train ride. All other major cities are reachable by a 2 to 4h train ride ( city center to city center )
The city is question is Toulouse. It’s just take too long from Paris. I Had to fly for this one.
Marseille,Lyon,Lille; Strasbourg, Metz, Bordeaux,Nantes, Montpellier, Rennes.
All those cities, I was able to take the first train in the morning. Do the fucking thing. Have dinner there on the client. And fall asleep in the last train. Waking up a midnight or so in Paris.
I had the choice to take a plane. But for the route in question in the article, it was consistently suboptimal.