Cargo haulage makes up for lost rail travel tickets

Successive bans on travel between Greece's regions since the start of the pandemic and restrictions on passenger numbers dragged revenues from ticket sales down to 57.9 million euros in 2020, Greek rail operator Trainose has reported.

The 44% year-on-year decline, however, was partly offset by the resilience of cargo haulage, with revenues edging up 0.18% to 13.9 million euros last year.

Trainose also reported that Greece's first high-speed train will be ready to launch next month after undergoing successful trials. The Italian-built ElettroTreno 470 has a capacity of 600 seats and is expected to boost ticket sales by slashing the time it takes to travel between Athens and Thessaloniki.

The ETR 470 will be able to travel at speeds of up to 160 kilometers per hour - below its conventional speed of 200 km/h - though only on certain parts of the network, which is...