LNWR John Speller's Web Pages France

John Speller's Web Pages - French Railways
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By the twentieth century the main railway companies in France were the Chemin de Fer de l'Est, the Chemin de Fer du Nord, the Chemins de fer de Paris à Lyon et à la Méditerranée, the Chemin de Fer Paris-Orléans and the Chemin de Fer du Midi. The railways of France were nationalized in 1938 under the auspices of the Société Nationale des Chemins de fer Francais (SNCF).
Historical map of French Railways in 1860. Image courtesy of Wikipedia Commons
The surrealistic image of 2-4-0 locomotive No. 721 of the Chemin de Fer de l'Ouest after crashing through the buffers as the Gare Montparnasse in Paris on 22 October 1895. The driver, fireman and five passengers were slightly injured. A woman in the street was killed by falling masonry.
The TGV (Train à Grande Vitesse) of the twenty-first century at the Gare de Lyon in Paris. Image courtesy of Wikipedia Commons. On 3 April 2007 the TGV V150 achieved a world record for a conventional railway of 357 mph. The video suggests that the main factor preventing the train from going even faster was the difficulty of keeping the pantograph in contact with the overhead wires. Alstom TGVs operate between Paris and Strasbourg and in normal operation reach speeds of 196 mph daily
SNCF CC locomotive No. 7121, which achieved a world speed record of 151 mph between Dijon and Beaune on 21 February 1954. See video. The following year a special test train reached a speed of 206 mph. See [1], [2] and [3]
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