Nor is the price, Switzerland (all over incl buses & boats) = GBP 2'850) UK (just Swindon to Paddington, no buses, no boats not any other trains = GBP 11'000.-- (incl tea, coffee and meal)

My only late Swiss trains have arrived from other countries....
Venice to Lausanne was late AND
Mainz(Germany) or Mannheim(Germany) to Bern

All in all though - I rarely see a late train at the Neuchatel station... and if i do - its usually the TGV! Ooooo yep - that would be from another country too!

You're in the French part of Switzerland. They are a bit.... french.

The trams run late too. It has caused me to either run like a b!tch to catch the s-bahns if I am going out of Zurich or miss them. I was pretty annoyed at first about it but oh well....least the transport system here is still works and doesnt go on strike every couple of months *ahem*

Yes, that as well as Chur - Zurich HB train.

The train from Basel to Bern was late a few times, and my bf kept track of it, and wrote an email to the SBB complaining that he was having to take an earlier train to make it to his meetings (etc..) and he got loads of vouchers for travel and food on the trains.

The point of the story...complain, complain, complain..but just take it to the SBB

The "Swiss trains always being on time" applies to the German regions with trains running between Germany regions. And then they are not perfect. Get outside that region into the French part and you'll have to depend on luck.

Since everything from Luzern to Zurich is so tightly scheduled, a minor delay in one spot can cause some larger problems elsewhere.

And a major problem, such as last Friday's personenunfall in Ebikon, caused huge delays along that line.

We commute with the train, but don't have to transfer, so we don't always notice the 2-5 minute delays. Still beats being stuck in traffic.

A few comments in response to all this.

First, for a train to be officially "late" according to the Swiss train companies, it must be at least 2 minutes late. When they publish statistics about the percentage of trains that are late, they use this definition, and they normally also give the percentage of trains that arrive more than 5 minutes late. Comparing it to other countries is difficult because different train companies have different definitions of how late a train needs to be to be considered officially 'late'.

Second, the Lausanne-Geneva line is running at absolutely maximum capacity during rush hours, making delays more likely there than anywhere else. This has been an issue for some years now. There has been a lot of discussion during this time about adding a third track for the length of this route, but the last I heard was that there is still no plan to actually do so.

Third, the LEB is nothing like the SBB, it is barely more than a tram, so should not be considered in the same context. It should only be discussed in the context of the local Lausanne transport system (Transit Lausanne) and not with the national train network (which it isn't even directly connected to).

EDIT: I found an interesting article comparing the Lausanne-Geneva line to the rest of the Swiss rail network, and giving some other useful info. The link popped up in Google, but then didn't work. The cached Google file is here, which hopefully you will all be able to read. Here are some highlights:

"CFF spokesman Jean-Philippe Schmidt said about 94 to 96.5 percent of trains on the line between Geneva and Lausanne arrived less than five minutes late in 2007, compared to 92.4 percent between Berne and Zurich, and an average about 94 to 95 percent nationally. ... “We’re at close to maximum capacity, more than usual in Europe.” With a train every 12 minutes on average nationwide, it’s world record. ... Between Lausanne and Geneva, it needs at least part of the long-delayed third track on the line in order to keep up with an expected growth in demand. Last week [article published in May 2008], senior officials from the cantons of Geneva and Vaud said they were looking at ways of financing it together at regional level for the first time, instead of relying on the usual federal funding. “Around Zurich, regional authorities introduced a policy of financing local rail services 20 to 30 years ago. Western Switzerland’s interest in that has come much later,” Schmidt said."

Alright we've all had our little whinge (even me), but step back for a moment for a little bit of perspective. Ok now compare what we have here for a transport system to what you had in your country of origin.

There, I'm feeling infinitely better now, what about you?

I absolutely agree that the rail system here is phenomenal - it just doesn't measure up to the rumored level of punctuality. Haven't you heard all the stories about being able to set your watch based on the trains? A friend of my told me that they had a Swiss postdoc rent a room from them for a summer. When my friend made a joke about Swiss trains running on time, the Swiss woman was not amused - she apparently did not consider that a topic to joke about.

I know of no other country in the world where one
would ever consider this a realistic prospect...
.

But that three minute connection is the way SBB says she should travel between those two stations at that time of day. It sounds like the railroad is incorporating unrealistic assumptions into their schedules.

Well, my country of origin is Switzerland, but I'd like to compare it to the area in the USA which I call home too, the Grand Traverse Area in Michigan.

Honestly, I've never noticed a single minute of delay there, much better than in Switzerland. Granted, there are no passenger trains in an area twice as big as Switzerland, which makes things a bit simpler. The next bus station is four miles away, with five connections per day in each direction. That makes only five delayed busses a day, compared with up to 85 delayed busses in Switzerland. Isn't statitistics fun?

yes! I thought the leb is a normal train, thats it!

Like I said the Lausanne Geneva was fine and nice...

Although my comments are quite objective for..the LEB only!

it su.cks. it's proven.


Other trains might be cool then I don't know I just did basel, biel, lausanne, geneva, a few times. It was fine.

Expect maybe in Basel where they were poor indications on how to join lausanne, but I asked and I had to commute to Biel or Bern to know more.

I'm a fairly heavy user of the trains between Lausanne and Nyon. They went from a stellar on-time record to a rather dodgy one beginning about six weeks ago. Not sure what changed....