No good news for international connections between France and Italy. A press release from the Prefecture of Savoie published a few days ago indicates that rail service between the two countries via Modane will not be restored for a year or in any case, in the best case scenario, before the summer of 2024.
On the French side, regional trains are ending and will end their circulation until the reopening at St. Michel de Maurienne, from where passengers will continue thanks to replacement buses to Modane. The same thing will be done with the winter TGVs which usually take skiers to the Alps.
In fact, the work on the section affected by the landslide in Maurienne is more complicated than expected. Restoration operations on the mountain are currently underway and it will most likely be necessary to destroy the tunnel above (an artificial tunnel which was built specifically to protect trains from a possible landslide and which therefore played its role perfectly ) and rebuild from scratch.
What is plan B?
If you want to avoid the plane, the other rail solutions are via Switzerland (around 9 hours between Paris and Milan with a connection from Basel, Geneva or Zurich) or, even longer, via Nice (around 13 hours between Paris and Milan with two connections, because you have to arrive at Ventimiglia from Nice, to then take a regional train once in Italian territory).
Otherwise, by bus, with Flixbus or BlaBlaCar, and it takes around 12 hours to travel.
As we announced to you in our article of September 1, it is also difficult to get there by road, due to the closure of the Mont-Blanc tunnel for work; The construction site, which was to start on September 4, was delayed due to the landslide that occurred a week earlier.
