Save time to bring Châteaudun (Eure-et-Loir) closer to Paris. Today, it takes an hour and a half by TER to reach the two cities. To open up the south of Eure-et-Loir, Fabien Verdier, mayor of the small sub-prefectural town, dreams of saving the minutes to reach the capital. His proposal: an “accelerated TER”. “The idea is to go quickly to Paris, we are domesticated by the RER C, that means that our train is held behind,” explains the elected official who would like a prioritization of the TER over the RER C with a siding, between Dourdan (Essonne) and Brétigny-sur-Orge (Essonne), and signaling work. Between these two cities, the track is monorail and does not allow the TER to overtake the RER, a real omnibus.
By making this choice, 22 minutes could be saved for commuters between Tours (Indre-et-Loire), terminus of the line and Austerlitz station. “It’s a 2013 study from RFF which confirms this,” the Dunois councilor believes. Fewer trains on the line could also make it possible to strengthen the connection with “an increase in the number of daily return trips which would benefit the inhabitants of Center-Val de Loire but also Ile-de-France. “It serves Dourdan (Essonne), but also southern Yvelines. Rather than having an omnibus RER C, it’s a win-win for both territories,” promises the man who is also President of the movement for the development of sub-prefectural cities.
An interview with Valérie Pécresse
This idea, the first magistrate of Châteaudun submitted it to Valérie Pécresse, president of the Ile-de-France Region, between two doors during an informal meeting on the occasion of a meeting with other mayors, the March 20, at the headquarters of the Regional Council, in Saint-Ouen (Seine-Saint-Denis). “We talked about mobility and train lines, a topic on which she is competent,” assumes the mayor. To grab “another 5 minutes”, the mayor of Dunois also pleads to “get off at the BNF (National Library of France) to reach the heart of Paris via metro line 14”.
Last argument put forward by the mayor of Châteaudun to the presidential candidate in 2022, that of the future PSG stadium. To accommodate it, “we need more regular trains,” admits the forty-year-old. The Île-de-France region confirms this exchange and indicates that the feasibility “must be studied in conjunction with the president of the Centre-Val de Loire region and has no other comments to make at this stage of the file”.