France

Canua Island will not be making its inaugural season off the coast of Mandelieu-la-Napoule. The 1,750 m2 event barge has failed to obtain the navigation and outfitting permits it needs to operate. The hundred or so employees, including 20 sailors, were made redundant even before setting sail for the first time. With a capacity of...

(Article updated on 19 June) After Trenitalia, the opening up to competition in the rail sector is about to become a little more of a reality in France with the arrival of Renfe. The Spanish national operator plans to launch an AVE line between Lyon and Barcelona on 13 July. Renfe will then inaugurate the Marseille-Barcelona-Madrid route on 28...

The Dutch government has given rail operators until 10 June to offer services on international routes. Arriva Netherlands has seized this opportunity. On 8 June, this subsidiary of Deutsche Bahn submitted a route application to the Dutch Consumer and Markets Authority (ACM). The operator wants to...

Employees scattered like jigsaw puzzles, management split up, teams struggling to find each other: the changing world of work, accelerated by the pandemic, is turning companies' habits upside down. In some cases, companies have simply abandoned the idea of having offices and switched to full remote working. This is nothing new, but this...

On Tuesday, France officially banned the operation of domestic short-haul flights on routes where there is a rail service linking two points in less than 2.5 hours. This provision had been announced in August 2021 when the Climate and Resilience Act was promulgated. However, it had to be suspended following a...

The Radisson group is adding to the portfolio of its Radisson Individuals collection of independent hotels, particularly in France. After welcoming a new member near the capital, the YAC Paris Clichy, the brand is heading for Normandy with a boutique hotel in Honfleur, Les Maisons de Léa. Located in the heart of...

Euroairport Basel-Mulhouse may be a medium-sized airport with 7.05 million passengers in 2022, but it is still subject to regular congestion at its facilities. France's sixth-largest hub has seen more traffic in the past than it does today. In 2019, the airport welcomed 9.1 million passengers. At the time, it ranked...

After Rennes last March - and before Nice in 2024 - Mama Shelter is continuing its expansion in France's major provincial cities, with an opening announced for Dijon in July. Already present in Bordeaux, Lille, Lyon, Marseille and Toulouse, the lifestyle brand launched by the Trigano family and now part of the Mama Shelter network, has...

After the programme that gave birth to the TGV forty years ago, a project on the same scale - 100 billion euros - is preparing to revolutionise the French rail world in the decades to come. Not at high speed this time, but at the gentle pace of commuter or regional trains. A...

Beauvais, Ajaccio, Calvi as well as Paris-Orly, Bastia, Biarritz, Marseille, Montpellier and Nice. The first three will have managed to have passenger traffic above that of 2019. As for the other six airports on this list, they recorded a fall below the national average. In all, 14 airports in mainland France recorded...

Belambra is providing further proof of the sustained growth of the MICE sector in France. The French leader in holiday clubs will be dedicating four of its sites entirely to business customers during the peak seminar season. In May and June on the one hand, and in September-October on the other, the clubs at Anglet, La Grande Motte,...

Beauvais airport, 90 km north of Paris, has to manage its success. The hub, set in the middle of the fields of the Picardy plain, is in fact the only French airport to have managed to exceed in 2022 the traffic of the key year 2019, the last before the Covid crisis. Last year, Beauvais was...

Private jets have been in the eye of the storm for several years in France, particularly with the problems associated with pollution and global warming. Many left-wing and ecologist MPs are simply calling for a ban on general aviation in France, describing it as "aviation for the rich" in addition to the nuisance it generates. According to a...

With another day of general strikes against pension reform - the tenth - scheduled for Thursday 6 April, business travel in France is likely to be disrupted, but to a lesser extent than during previous strikes. As far as air travel is concerned, the French Civil Aviation Authority (DGAC) is not forecasting any disruption...

Following the success of Ouigo in Spain, SNCF plans to roll out its low-cost concept in Italy by 2026, according to information presented by Le Parisien on 15 March. Called Allegro, this project - which is due to be made official by SNCF shortly - involves operating high-speed trains on the Turin-Milan-Rome-Naples routes...

Choice Hotels has just announced a refresh of its Ascend Collection brand, which now focuses on a "world dedicated to Hygge". Why this change? Jonathan Mills - Without all travellers being aware of it, the Ascend Collection, which now includes almost 70 hotels in Europe, was the first 'collection' brand in the world, before it became the first 'Hygge' brand in...

While IHG has made the luxury and lifestyle hotel sector one of its main areas of development, this strategy does not obscure the fact that, in addition to all the InterContinental, Kimpton and Regent hotels to come, the Holiday Inn family of brands remains one of its most solid growth guarantees. Between them, the Holiday...

The new segmentation of Appart'City's offering will soon be taking shape. After sketching out the outline last autumn, France's leading provider of city apartment hotels has set 3 April as the launch date for its new brand architecture. Previously, its offering was based on two ranges, Appart'City and Appart'City Confort...

Euroairport Basel-Mulhouse is steadily strengthening its position in holiday destinations to the Mediterranean. This can be seen in the timetable for the summer 2023 flight plan (valid from 26 March 2023 to 28 October 2023). The Franco-Swiss hub will nevertheless offer 100 destinations on direct flights. The Mediterranean and North Africa in the spotlight On...

Air France is returning to a similar schedule of services this summer as in 2019. The airline is responding to strong passenger demand and will be offering up to 835 flights a day to 191 destinations in 89 countries from the end of March. This development particularly concerns long-haul, with 85 destinations. The reopening of...