Travelling to Europe by train

By Max Coleman, Research Student (Meteorology)

You’re planning on attending a meeting, workshop, conference or similar. Now that covid-19 rules have relaxed, you’re looking forward to meeting some old colleagues in person for the first time in years, or even going to your first in person conference. It’s international, so you need to plan how to get there. But now that remote options exist, you’re wondering ‘can I justify flying there again now? Is it practical to travel more sustainably, and how do I do it?’. Or maybe you’ve never really thought about the impact of your work travel before.

Well, if any of this applies, hopefully this post will offer some insight into travelling more sustainably, and maybe even convince you it’s worth doing!

The problem above is exactly the sort of thing we consider as part of Dr Carbon. Dr Carbon is an initiative in SMPCS, working with the university’s Sustainability Services, aiming to quantify, track and identify ways to reduce the school’s climate impact. As part of these efforts, travel has been identified as the largest source of emissions for the Department of Meteorology, principally arising from business flights.

However, there are of course alternative, more sustainable, ways to travel. Now obviously this isn’t just a new trend following covid-19. But having recently travelled (like many colleagues) by alternative means to the first hybrid European Geosciences Union annual conference since the pandemic, now seemed a good time to write about sustainable travel – and hopefully, offer some useful insights and tips along the way.

Firstly, how sustainable are the alternatives? Figure 1 illustrates the carbon footprint per km of different forms of transport: taking a domestic UK train produces almost 4x less CO2e less than flying, and the Eurostar around 25x less. If you could get a carpool of 4 people together, that’s not too bad either – but possibly less comfortable!

As this conference is held in Vienna, Austria, it was straightforward for us to get there by train. There are however several different obvious routes, including options to travel there in a day, catch an overnight ‘Nightjet’ train, or stay somewhere overnight on the way. This leads us to our first tip: use Man in Seat 61 if you want to find alternative travel to flying – it’s especially detailed for Europe, but also has suggestions for getting to many places globally (yes, even Australia!). Their website outlines the best routes between places so you can easily identify your preferred option.

Now, onto the journey. I travelled out with three colleagues, going with the one-day travel option on the way out. Since the journey is about ~1400 km it really does take a whole day. We left home at 04:45 to catch a bus to Reading station and arrived in Vienna at about 23:05 – a long time mainly sitting down. The plus side is it’s easier to take a walk along a train or stand in the door area if you need to stretch than on a plane! On the train from Frankfurt there was also a restaurant car you can eat in if you want a change. 

Us departing London St Pancras, and a friendly reminder from Deutsche Bahn why we’re travelling by train!

As for the return, the four of us made our own plans. Two of my colleagues headed back after the conference via the Nightjet sleeper train, departing Vienna in the evening and arriving at Paris the morning after, followed by a Eurostar from there back to St Pancras. Another colleague used the opportunity to visit a friend in Germany. I went sightseeing in Vienna for a few days, caught the Nightjet to Paris for more sightseeing, and then the Eurostar back. However you travel, it’s sustainable if you can add your holiday or seeing a friend to your trip!

Personally, I enjoyed the one-day travel out most, as the views can be a real selling point. I found it comfortable and spacious enough to get some work done (the trains seemed to have good wifi too) and read and relax for a bit too. However, if you’re not sure about being on trains for a whole day, a sleeper train might be for you. The Nightjet trains operating through central Europe, have a range of options, from private compartments, to shared ‘couchettes’ (think bunk beds) or normal seating. We tried out the normal seating compartments for sleeping, and while it wasn’t too bad, I would recommend the compartments or couchettes, although they are more expensive.

Some views of the Belgian and French countryside (apologies my photography isn’t all that good!)

Whichever option you go for, there’s a definite sense of adventure going by train. Obviously, it’s slower than flying. But if you don’t mind working (or relaxing) on a train, it doesn’t feel like you’re ‘wasting’ time. And if you can go with colleagues, that’ll make it more enjoyable and less daunting if it’s your first long train journey.

Hopefully that’s inspired you to consider catching the train (or a coach/ferry!) on your next conference trip. If you’d like any more inspiration, checkout #traintoEGU (or #train2EGU if you’re hip) on Twitter for plenty of other researchers sharing their train travelling experiences, or feel free to email me. And enjoy your sustainable travel!