Eurostar speeds into history

THE Queen launched a luxurious new international rail terminal in London today, marking the beginning of a new era of high-speed train travel linking Britain to continental Europe.

New era ... a light-and-sound show commemorates the opening of a new luxurious international rail terminal in London and a high-speed train link between Britain and Europe / AFP

THE Queen launched a luxurious new international rail terminal in London today, marking the beginning of a new era of high-speed train travel linking Britain to continental Europe.

As an invited audience of a thousand people looked on, trains glided into platforms at St Pancras station to the sound of classical music performed by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and a state-of-the-art light show.

The station, a long-neglected Victorian gothic masterpiece, has been scrubbed up and transformed into a swanky rail hub connecting Britain to France and Belgium.

The Queen and her husband Prince Philip, fresh from the pomp and pageantry of the State Opening of Parliament, opened the revamped station, the culmination of a STG5.8 billion ($13.1 billion), 10-year project.

"My warmest congratulations go to everyone involved in this project, which is a wonderful illustration of what can be achieved through working in partnership, and it says a good deal about how we can take a 21st century approach whilst at the same time having due consideration of our heritage," she said.

Services on the new 68-mile (109-kilometre) rail line between St Pancras and the Channel Tunnel will link London with Paris in two hours, 15 minutes, and London with Brussels in one hour, 51 minutes.

Eurostar will switch its services on November 14 from Waterloo station, south of the River Thames, to St Pancras on the north side, making it easier for passengers from the English Midlands, northern England and Scotland to connect to the continent.

The new line enables Eurostar trains to hit their full speed of 300 kilometres per hour, cutting journey times between London and continental Europe by at least 20 minutes.

Instead of rolling along from the coast then clunking and grinding past the rooftops and grimy brick railway arches of south London, passengers will whizz through the Kent countryside before speeding underground across the capital.

Eurostar has pledged to make the journeys carbon neutral by improving energy efficiency and offsetting carbon emissions.

James Bidwell, chief executive of the Visit London tourism agency, hailed the inauguration.

"The culmination of the 10-year St Pancras restoration project is a truly historic moment for London and symbolic of our great city as we prepare for (the) 2012 (Olympics)," he said.

Built in 1868, nearly 140 years of dirt has been scraped from the station's brickwork during the 800-million-pound restoration.

The new-look station has been kitted out with Wifi, touchscreen monitors and passenger information screens. It also hosts Europe's biggest champagne bar -- 90 metres (295 feet) long -- along with a plethora of upmarket boutiques.

London's Evening Standard newspaper said it was an "engineering triumph".

"Britain's transport infrastructure has many failings. But tonight's ceremony shows that this country still knows how to build a railway."

Rail travel has often been a source of misery in Britain, through the mass closure of local stations to strikes in the 1960s to packed, sweaty commuter trains and leaves on the line blamed for holding up services.

Britons have often looked abroad with envy as French passengers hurtle along on the TGV or Japanese travellers cruise in futuristic "bullet trains".

But the new rail line has inspired hope that train travel in Britain could finally be something to boast about.

"St Pancras is a rare example of upstaging the French at a game they usually play better than us," rail expert Christian Wolmar said.

"Such audacious design" in the refurbishment of an old building "is rare in this country where the powerful heritage lobby ... holds sway.

"It would be churlish not to celebrate this momentous event but it's a shame there is not another on the way," he wrote in the Evening Standard.