I will be departing a River Cruise in Basel and wanted to train to Colmar for several days. From what I have read it's best to buy the ticket from the "French side" of the train station at Basel. Was just wondering if anyone has taken the train and the best purchase information. I will be traveling on a Sunday and returning to Basel on Tuesday. Thank you for any information and suggestions.
Posted by
Green Bay
20145 posts
I believe what you read is from the pre-Schengen days, when people arriving from France arrived on stub tracks 1 to 3 and showed their passport. The local French trains to/from Colmar still use the tracks, but the border checks disappeared. I don't see any separate ticket desks, they appear to be all one.
http://plans.trafimage.ch/basel-sbb?lang=en#?layer=basel_innenplan&x=611372&y=266301&r=0.39
Posted by
Brisbane, Australia
126 posts
There is a station across the Rhine called “Basel Badischer Bahnhof”, it’s on the German side of the Rhine but still in Switzerland.
The station you want is on the southern side of the Rhine called ‘Basel SBB’
Posted by
Basel, Switzerland
8889 posts
Pat, a little local info.
SBB (Swiss railways) and SNCF (French railways) share a station, known as "Basel SBB", though the French sometimes call it "Bâle SNCF".
There is a totally different station called "Basel Badischer Bahnhof" owned by DB (German Railways), but you can forget about that one.
Trains to Colmar are 200 Kph (125 Mph) trains called "TER 200" that do the run Basel - Mulhouse - Colmar - Sélestat - Strasbourg. These are totally French trains that start and end in the SNCF part of the station. This is platforms 30 to 35, at the right hand side of the station plan here: http://www.sbb.ch/content/dam/infrastruktur/trafimage/bahnhofplaene/plan-basel-sbb-a4.pdf
As these are SNCF trains, you cannot buy tickets from the SBB ticket machines. There is one SNCF ticket machine, just by the entrance to customs (square G4 on the plan). It only takes Euros (cash). The alternative is to buy your ticket from the ticket window "Schalterhalle" (= ticket office hall, square E4 on the plan), which sells tickets for all 3 railway companies. But you might have to queue 5-10 minutes if it is busy.
There is a photo of the ticket counter in the "Schalterhalle" here: http://www.maxlehmann.ch/wpeuro/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/IMG_1401-Basel-Bahnhof-SBB-Schalterhalle-PICASA-BASEL-HIT5-75bpi.jpg
They all speak English.
Posted by
Northamptonshire, England
32805 posts
Oh my goodness gracious me. You mean that the old flappy window trains are all gone to be replaced by something modern? ah well, have to move forward sometimes, I s'pose.
Posted by
OP
foley
15 posts
Sam, Baz and Chris- Thank you for your comments and information and especially the websites!
This was really helpful and I appreciate you taking the time to answer me. Chris, look forward to seeing your part of the world!