The Société nationale des chemins de fer français (, lit. 'National Company of the French Railways', SNCF ) is France's state-owned railway operator. Becoming effective on 1 January 1938 following an agreement on 31 August 1937 between the government, private railway companies and railway labor unions,[3] it operates nearly all rail transport in France and Monaco, including the TGV, on France's high-speed rail network. Its functions include operation of railway services for passengers and freight (through its subsidiaries SNCF Voyageurs and Rail Logistics Europe), as well as railway infrastructure management (SNCF Réseau). The railway network consists of about 35,000 km of route, of which 2,600 km are high-speed lines and 14,500 km electrified. More than 14,000 trains are operated daily.
In 2010 the SNCF was ranked 22nd in France and 214th globally on the Fortune Global 500 list.[4] It is the main business of the SNCF Group, which in 2020 had €30 billion of sales in 120 countries.[5] The SNCF Group employs more than 275,000 employees in France and around the world.[6] Since July 2013, the SNCF Group headquarters are located in a Parisian suburb at 2 Place aux Étoiles in Saint-Denis. The president of SNCF Group has been Jean Castex since 2025.
Business scope
High-speed rail
SNCF operates almost all of France's railway traffic, including the TGV (Train à Grande Vitesse, meaning "high-speed train"). In the 1970s, the SNCF began the TGV high-speed train program with the intention of creating the world's fastest railway network. It came to fruition in 1981 with the completion of the first high-speed line LGV Sud-Est ("Ligne à Grande Vitesse Sud-Est", meaning "southeast high-speed line"), where the first TGV service, from Paris to Lyon, was inaugurated. In 2017, the national rail network owned by SNCF Réseau had 28,710 km (17,839 mi) of lines, 58% of which were electrified and 2,640 high-speed lines. Every day, the SNCF runs 15,000 commercial trains and transports more than 5 million passengers and more than 250,000 tonnes of goods.[7] TGV lines and TGV technology are now spread across several European countries.
The SNCF's TGV has set many world speed records, the most recent on 3 April 2007, when a new version of the TGV dubbed the V150 with larger wheels than the usual TGV, was able to cover more ground with each rotation and had a stronger 18600 kW engine, and broke the world speed record for conventional railway trains, reaching 574.8 km/h.
The SNCF has a remarkable safety record. After nearly 30 years in operation, SNCF's TGV system has only experienced
History
SNCF was formed in 1938 with the nationalisation of France's main railway companies (Chemin de fer, literally, 'way of iron', means railway). These were the:
The French state originally took 51% ownership of SNCF. For a period of 45 years (until 1 January 1983), the other 49% belonged to shareholders of financial companies that succeeded the former companies. Since then, SNCF is wholly owned by the French state. The state invested large amounts of public subsidies into the system.
- Chemins de fer de l'Est (Est, Eastern Railways)
- Chemins de fer de l'État (État, State Railways; merged in 1908 with the Chemins de fer de l'Ouest, Western Railways)
- Chemins de fer du Nord (Nord, Northern Railways)
- Chemins de fer de Paris à Lyon et à la Méditerranée (PLM, Paris, Lyon and Mediterranean Railways)
- Chemins de fer de Paris à Orléans et du Midi (Paris, Orléans and Southern Railways; PO-Midi, formed in 1934 from the merger of the Chemin de fer de Paris à Orléans and the Chemins de fer du Midi)
- Administration des chemins de fer d'Alsace et de Lorraine (AL, Alsace-Lorraine Railways)
- Syndicats du Chemin de fer de
Codeshare with airlines
SNCF has codeshare agreements with the following airlines:
In exchange, SNCF allows passengers on these flights to book railway services between Charles de Gaulle Airport in Roissy (in Paris’s suburbs) and Aix-en-Provence, Angers, Avignon, Bordeaux, Le Mans, Lille, Lyon Part-Dieu, Marseille, Montpellier, Nantes, Nîmes, Poitiers, Rennes, Strasbourg, Tours, and Valence with their airline. The IATA designator used by airlines in connection with these journeys is 2C.[40]
Continental Airlines discontinued its codeshare with SNCF on 15 August 2010.[41]
Company structure
Headquarters
Until 1999, the SNCF's historic headquarters was located at 88 Rue Saint-Lazare in the 9th arrondissement.[42] In 1996 the chairman of SNCF, Louis Gallois, announced that SNCF would move its headquarters to a new location during the middle of 1997.[43]
From 1999 to 2013, SNCF's headquarters were located in the Montparnasse neighborhood of the 14th arrondissement of Paris,[44] located near the Gare Montparnasse.[45]
Since July 2013, the SNCF headquarters are located in the Parisian suburb of Saint-Denis at 2, place aux Étoiles, 93200 Saint Denis
Company image
According to a TNS SOFRES survey published in 2010, 66% of French people have a good image of SNCF.[51] At the end of 2019, this proportion was measured at 50% by the Posternak-Ifop barometer on the image of companies.[52] In 2020, Eight Advisory and IFOP unveil their ranking of the "most admired French companies": SNCF is in 23rd position.[53]
Safety on trains is also often a priority. To do this, around 2,800 railway workers form the Railway Security, the general supervision of SNCF, of which 50% of the workforce is assigned to the Île-de-France region.
Furthermore, the experts of the BCG, Boston Consulting Group, use to compare the rail systems in 25 European countries. They rank France in tied 4th position (with Germany, Austria and Sweden), behind Switzerland, Denmark and Finland. The criteria are : the utilization rate, quality of service and safety.
Visual and sound identity
Logotype
SNCF's current visual logo was created in 2005 by the Carré Noir agency, a subsidiary of the Publicis communication group. It was slightly reworked in 2011: rounded corners, disappearance of shadows inside the letters as well as behind, and a clearer separation between them.
Sound identity
In 2005, the sound logo of the SNCF the four notes C – G – A♭ – E♭, in its sung version,[55] was created by Michaël Boumendil and the agency Sixième Son.[56]
David Gilmour, guitarist of the group Pink Floyd, used the jingle as the inspiration for the title track of his 2015 album Rattle That Lock.[57]
Culture
Cinema
Since the Auguste and Louis Lumière's first film, SNCF has been the company that hosts the most film shoots in France,[59] between 50 and 60 shoots per year, which represents around two thirds of French productions.[60] A selection of iconic films where SNCF is at the heart of the matter include:
- Hugo
- Mr. Bean's Holiday
- Mission: Impossible
- The Tourist
See also
- Autorité de Régulation des Activités Ferroviaires
- Corail (train)
- Dirigisme
- History of rail transport in France
- List of French companies
- List of SNCF locomotive and multiple-unit classes
- List of SNCF stations
- Transport express régional
- Transport in France
- Réseau Ferré National
- Grigny to Corbeil-Essonnes line
External links
References
- SNCF was reorganized from three EPICs to a holding company effective 1 January 2020. The official name of the surviving holding company remains Société nationale des chemins de fer français with no "S.A." suffix applied.^
- SNCF Group Financial Report 2022 SNCF Group, 2 March 2023, retrieved 29 August 2023^
- "Convention of August 31, 1937" by Antoine Albitreccia in Annales de Géographie, volume 47, number 266, pp. 206-207 1938)^