More trains to run between Oslo and Stockholm

Express train X2000, Gare du NordIllustration, Express train X2000. Photo: Per Løchen

Due to a steady rise in passenger numbers, the train route between Oslo and Stockholm is to increase the number of daily departures from three to five.

Managing Director of the Swedish railway company SJ, Christer Fritzson, has ‘big ambitions’ for the route, he told Dagsavisen newspaper.

‘Today, 1.4 million people are travelling by air between Oslo and Stockholm. We believe that in the long term we can get 35 percent of these individuals to travel by train instead’, said Fritzson.

In July, August and September this year, the number of SJ train service customers travelling between Oslo and Stockholm increased by 25 percent.

Fritzson said ‘We’ve already hijacked nearly 10 percent of approximately 1.4 million people who travel annually between the two cities.

SJ reserved their fastest and most modern train, the X 2000, for the route in August last year, and increased the number of daily flights from two to three. In December, it will increase to five.

The train trip between the two capitals now takes just under four hours, and Fritzson promises that from 2017 trains will be more punctual.

So far SJ have struggled with a single track on parts of the line that makes it difficult to catch up with delays.

 

Source: NTB scanpix / Norway Today