TGV Lyria

TGV Lyria is service brand used for TGV lines connecting France and Switzerland. Lyria is also a corporation that runs the service using SNCF staff in France and SBB CFF FFS staff in Switzerland (the staff change on the border).

Corporate status

Initially, the corporation was a "groupement d'intérêt économique" (literally, group of (shared) economic interest) between SNCF and SBB-CFF-FFS whose goal was the creation of TGV service between Gare de Lyon (Paris) and Lausanne/Bern. Today, the corporation is officially a "société par actions simplifiée" (limited company) by French law. SNCF owns 74% of the capital and CFF owns the remaining 26%.

History

Starting with the summer of 1961, the route between Paris and Lausanne was operated by the Trans Europ Express Cisalpin trains, which continued on to Milan. On January 22, 1984, this service was replaced by a new TGV service with tri-current locomotives, though service was cut back to Lausanne. In the spirit of the previous European expresses, the trains were christened with names: Champs-Elysées, Lemano, Lutetia, and Cisalpin. On May 31, 1987, the train service was rebranded as EuroCity; by this time, service to Bern was in place as well. The GIE was created for the first time on May 23, 1993 to operate the segments between Paris and Lausanne/Bern. Service to Geneva was not covered at that time. During the winter of 1995–1996, a single roundtrip per day was extended from Lausanne to Brigue to stop...
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