CDG Express and RER B: Valérie Pécresse threatens SNCF Network

"The board of directors has mandated this morning the general manager of Ile-de-France Mobilités to suspend the tolls paid to SNCF Réseau for the (trains) of the north beam, that is to say the RER B and D in particular, if SNCF Réseau did not carry out on time (...) the studies which were requested of it on the de-nesting of the work of the RER B and CDG Express, "Ms. Pécresse told journalists.

The leader accused SNCF Réseau of "procrastinating", while the study is "essential" according to her.

The renovation work on the RER B north of Paris is in fact linked to the CDG Express site, a rapid link which in 2025 will link the capital to Roissy airport, but it is still threatened by legal proceedings which still has to take several months.

A judgment of the administrative court of Montreuil (Seine-Saint-Denis) has indeed stopped the work in early November 2020 by canceling a derogation from the environmental authorization allowing to cross areas where protected species live.

The Paris Administrative Court of Appeal authorized the resumption of the site in March, but it still has to rule on the merits.

"We cannot have a plan B," said Valérie Pécresse, recalling that the CDG Express project includes 500 million euros (out of 2,2 billion) intended to improve the RER B.

She said she did not want to "take the risk that in six months, the Administrative Court of Appeal cancels the environmental authorization for 500 million RER B regeneration works".

"It is absolutely necessary that we have plan B if ever the judge confirmed the cancellation of the environmental authorization, because that would mean setting out again for two years of proceedings," she continued. "And that the RER B can not stand!"

"SNCF Réseau must consider this worst-case scenario," insisted Ms. Pécresse.

Asked by AFP, SNCF Réseau declined to comment.