The newest – and for the time being last – TramTrain line in Greater Paris, the T12 from Massy to Évry-Courcouronnes, has been been officially inaugurated today – 9 December 2023, scheduled revenue service starts on 10 December 2023.
40,000 travellers a day are expected as soon as the traffic has settled in over the coming months. The T12 connects a total of 12 different residential districts on its 20 km route through the Parisian suburbs in the south and south-east of the Ile-de-France, the conurbation around the French capital. These include Massy, Palaiseau, Champlan, Longjumeau, Chilly-Mazarin, Épinay-sur-Orge, Savigny-sur-Orge, Morsang-sur-Orge, Viry-Chatillon, Grigny , Ris-Orangis and Évry-Courcouronnes. 16 stations are served, 11 of which are completely new stops, all of which are of course barrier-free.
The T12 was created by converting the Massy and Épinay-sur-Orge section previously served by the RER suburban railway (line bundle C) and supplementing it with the new section to Évry-Courcouronnes, which is more like a traditional tram line, even if it is largely road-independent like the entire line. The alignment and the extension projects also led to a noticeable redesign of the neighbouring road space and in some cases to a redistribution of traffic areas, redesign of intersections, etc.
The project
The project sponsors are Île-de-France Mobilités (new urban section from Épinay to Évry), SNCF Réseau (transport infrastructure and new stations on the national rail network) and SNCF Mobilités (maintenance and storage site and existing stations on the national rail network). The overall project was initiated more than 10 years ago, together with other TramTrain lines in the metropolitan area.
The timetable:
- 22 August 2013: DPU – declaration of public utility
- 2017-2018: Preparatory work and laying of networks
- 2018-2022: Line construction
- 2023: Tests and trial runs
- 10 December 2023 : Commissioning
Since then, a train has been running every 20 minutes during the day and every 10 minutes during rush hour.
Twenty-five of the Alstom Citadis Dualis already familiar from other French TramTrain lines are being used.
There are now 77 Alstom Citadis Dualis trains in operation in the Île-de-France region, 100% of which were financed by Ile-de-France Mobilités:
- 15 trains on line T11 (Épinay-sur-Seine – Le Bourget) since July 2017 and on Transilien line P (on the Esbly – Crécy-la-Chapelle section) since March 2022
- 26 trains on line T4 (Bondy – Aulnay-sous-Bois or Montfermeil) since December 2019
- 11 trains on the T13 line (Saint-Cyr-l’École – Saint-Germain-en-Laye) since July 2022
- 25 trains on the T12 line (Evry-Courcouronnes – Massy-Palaiseau).
Outside the Île-de-France region, the Citadis Dualis trams from Alstom are also in operation in Loire-Atlantique (Nantes) and west of Lyon.
