French railway company SNCF has launched a modernization program called Project Botox to extend the life of its TGV trains by up to 10 years. More than 100 trains will be tested and then upgraded, including some dating back to 1988, and it is hoped they can be used after 2030.

France has more than 2,700 km of high-speed rail lines, and the fleet of TGV trains is 363 units, which is 50 trains less than five years ago. The total number of seats increased by 10% as more double-decker (double-decker) TGVs were introduced.

From 2025, there will be new TGV M trains, the most modern to date, there will be 115 new electric trains, but this is still not enough, because the demand for tickets is increasing.

Old trains should continue to run longer.

To this end, the SNCF has launched a program called the Botox Project, in which no more than 104 TGVs will be modernized to extend their service life. Depending on the technical condition of each frame and the number of modifications that need to be made, the life of each frame can be extended by two to ten years. The cost of the program will be at least several hundred million euros.

The renovation will be completed in 2033, a quarter of the frames will be two-level, the majority will be one-level. The oldest trains that need to be checked to see if they can be upgraded are those built between 1988 and 1992.

More trains are needed, especially on routes like Paris to Bordeaux.

The first TGV line was inaugurated in 1981 and the Paris-Lyon journey took 2 hours 40 minutes, down from 4 hours (now reduced to less than two hours), with a top speed of 260 km/h. The fastest TGVs now travel at a speed of 320 km/h.

One of the first TGV trains built, a frame named Patrick, ran for 38 years until 2019, during which time it covered 14 million kilometers.

Sources: International Railway Journal, SNCF, BFMTV

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