High-speed trains seize short-haul market as fuel cost cripples the airlines

[phantom power]

The airline industry has been crushed by the price of kerosene and deserted by passengers fed up with delays. After decades of disappointment, false dawns and virtually bankrupt Channel Tunnels, we have finally arrived at the age of the train and the evidence is in the crowd at St Pancras.

Only eight months after opening its doors in November, the new station is choc-a-bloc at peak hours, an exciting but slightly nerve-wracking development for Eurostar and its biggest shareholder, SNCF, the French state railway.

Traffic growth on Eurostar is accelerating like an Alstom locomotive, increasing by 21 per cent in the first quarter, compared with the same period in 2007, and revenues are up by a quarter. Those figures were no flash in the pan, a boost from all the hooplah at last year's opening of St Pancras. Traffic in the second quarter has grown at similar rates, insiders say.

It would not be unfair to say that squeezing the London-Paris journey time by just 20 minutes has boosted Eurostar's income by 25 per cent.

http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/columnists/article4296525.ece

[fasttense]

1. One monopoly eating another.

Maybe the five oil monopolies should take over the airlines, the grocery stores, the Wal-Marts, the hardware stores, the electronic stores, the water utilities, the American government.