In France, the closure of stations or educate strains is a huge quantity in rural spaces. On the other hand, lately, some small stations have discovered new lifestyles through reworking into grocery shops, well being facilities and even places of work. For what estimate?
On August 31, 2025, the closure of the Guerre-Busso-Feletin railway line led to robust feelings. This situation is a ways from remoted. In February 2025, 200 folks collected at Ussel station (Corez) to reveal for the re-opening of the railway line on the name of the CGT-Cheminots of Tulle-Ussel.
Despite the fact that years have handed since its closure, the areas are firmly hooked up to the educate and proceed to mobilize for its go back. Probably the most causes is the loss of public shipping. 8 out of ten employees residing in in moderation populated spaces say they have got no choice to a automotive. This attachment allowed the delivery of a number of tasks to advertise small stations, equivalent to Aumont-Aubrac, Sevremoine and Hennebont.
Analysis tasks are actually being performed to take into consideration the way forward for small railway strains. That is the case of the leading edge mission of sunshine trains (TELLi), which targets to increase a rolling inventory tailored to those strains. The Heart for Research and Experience on Dangers, Setting, Mobility and Building (Cerema), a spouse on this mission, is carrying out social science analysis to decide the stipulations for the luck of sunshine rail techniques.
My thesis specializes in small rural stations, the access level to the railway community. Probably the most defended hypotheses: native building experiments give a contribution to strengthening the relationship between the territory and the educate.
Small queues, giant difficulties
Those small railway strains were underneath assault for a number of years, they’re threatened with drastic velocity limits or a whole stoppage of visitors. However how did this secondary railway community, which finely connects the territory, step by step grow to be deserted?
This example is defined through robust automotive festival, which considerably decreased the selection of passengers on positive strains. Because of the loss of credible possible choices, 80% of journeys in those spaces are actually made through automotive. As the upkeep of this secondary railway community turned into too dear, the coverage of the SNCF operator appreciated investments within the so-called structural community in addition to high-speed strains.
Small railway strains constitute 7,600 kilometers of the nationwide railway community. A file ready through prefect Francois Filizot estimates that 40% of this native community is in danger because of loss of upkeep. In the similar file, the investments essential to deal with those railway strains are estimated at 7.6 billion euros through 2028.
The growing old of those strains, because of the loss of funding, ends up in a roughly important deterioration of the carrier. In rural spaces, 70% of small rail strains obtain lower than 20 trains consistent with day. On the other hand, because the mayor of Feletin reminds, whose line was once closed this yr because of the dilapidation of the infrastructure, “it is the service that drives driving, not the other way around.”
It’s conceivable to develop into the railway station into a store
Territories refuse to peer their stations disappear; they reappropriate and develop into them in line with native wishes.
As of 2023, the Aumont-Aubrac station in Losers has been reworked right into a Le Re’peire grocery retailer. The station construction, closed to passengers since 2015, discovered a 2nd lifestyles. Craft and native merchandise are offered there, contributing to the moral business supported through the mission initiators.
This modification of the station into a store is made conceivable through the Position de los angeles gare program of SNCF Gares & Connekions (subsidiary of SNCF Reseau). This encourages the status quo of recent actions and services and products thru renting inside a number of stations. The principle purpose is to permit the career of empty rooms within the stations, giving them a brand new serve as and thus averting their deterioration.
Le Re’peire in Aumont-Aubrac, in Loser. Tourism-Occitanie
Different tasks additionally gave the impression. The station of Los angeles Roche-en-Brenil (Cote-d’Or) was once changed into a well being heart, or the only within the the city of Briouze (Orne) into a 3rd position.
Those tasks advertise the improvement of financial actions in puts that naturally take pleasure in visibility. They take part within the revitalization of station spaces, attracting a various clientele, no longer simply passengers. The station turns into extra built-in into the lifetime of the neighborhood due to the exchanges and interactions that happen between passengers and different customers.
Co-construction with citizens of the station mission
Along with the straightforward conversion of constructions, positive tasks performed in rural stations select to offer a measurement of participation through involving educate customers and voters within the procedure.
Verbal exchange from the municipality of Sevremoin (Maine et Loire) for a decision for tasks geared toward occupying the station. Wikimedia, CC BI-SA
That is the case of Sevremoine station (Maine-et-Loire), owned through a municipality that made up our minds to modernize it through reimagining the encompassing public areas. For the station construction, it was once wanted to create new amenities to advertise social actions between citizens and associations.
4 consultations with voters made it conceivable to assemble voters’ wishes ahead of the smooth announcement. The Open Gare mission proposed through two town citizens was once decided on. This 3rd website, considering ecological and social transition, provides a number of services and products, equivalent to catering, a shared workspace and a neighborhood craft store.
Throughout all of the mission, conferences had been arranged to tell and accumulate comments from voters. Underneath the control of the collective passion cooperative and affiliation Open Gare, this co-developed website will open its doorways in 2027, after a duration of operation.
Associative actors taking the SNCF hat
Some projects cross additional through integrating all of the community.
That is proven through the instance of the affiliation Impending Departure for the Resort de los angeles Gare in Hennebont (Morbihan), which renovated the Resort de los angeles Gare construction, which is positioned a couple of steps from the station itself. Function: revitalization of the station and its community.
Tavern Ti Gar in Hennebont, close to Lorient. Lorientbretagnesouthtourism
This affiliation additionally occupies a passenger construction due to the Position de los angeles gare program. To any extent further, it’s conceivable to seek out more than a few services and products equivalent to places of work, lodging for hire, a restaurant and a workshop. The affiliation, which has now grow to be a cooperative of collective passion Tavarn Ti Gar, supplies reception and services and products to passengers at the flooring ground of the station. Any other experiment that emphasizes the dynamics of those territories and their population.
