Work on the CDG Express is scheduled to finish this weekend.

For 72 hours (Monday, May 25 being a public holiday), 300 SNCF Réseau operators and more than sixty staff from partner companies Eiffage and Alstom took turns connecting the 4,5 kilometers of new tracks, located between Gare de l'Est and La Plaine-Stade de France, to the Saint-Denis command post, from where all the installations and switches of the CDG Express will be controlled.

"This is really the birth of the physical line, of the CDG Express infrastructure this weekend (...) This is the last major milestone of seven years of work for SNCF Réseau," said Thomas Allary, director of major projects at SNCF Réseau, during a press briefing at the command post, from where the RER B north line, the H and K lines or some TER trains are already supervised.

During this "delicate operation", thousands of computer connections were made and ten signaling stations were modified and tested.

The CDG Express, currently under construction, is intended to connect the Gare de l'Est in Paris to Roissy-Charles de Gaulle Airport in twenty minutes, with a train running every fifteen minutes from 05:00 AM to midnight.

It is scheduled to be commissioned on March 28, 2027.

"The goal is to provide Paris with a new direct airport shuttle, like other international capitals," recalled Baptiste Maurand, president of the infrastructure manager CDG Express, to whom the concession was entrusted.

The project, led by Aéroports de Paris, Banque des territoires and SNCF Réseau, cost a total of 2,6 billion euros, financed in particular by a loan of 2,2 billion euros from the State.

According to SNCF Réseau, a significant portion of the work, estimated at 500 million euros, has improved infrastructure useful to the RER B.

For its promoters, the CDG Express helps to ease congestion on the A1 by absorbing 15% of road traffic and to relieve congestion on the RER B, one of the busiest lines in Europe which suffers from its age and regular breakdowns.

For its detractors, it is "transport for the rich", from which users in the Île-de-France region will not primarily benefit.

Initially announced at 24 euros, the final price of the journey, which is not included in the Navigo pass, has not yet been revealed by the operator Hello Paris.