Eurotunnel Le Shuttle[1] is a shuttle service between Calais/Coquelles in France and Folkestone in Britain. It conveys road vehicles by rail through the Channel Tunnel. Passenger and freight vehicles are carried in separate shuttle trains.
The service is owned and operated by Eurotunnel, the Channel Tunnel owners.
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The carriages used for the shuttle have a larger loading gauge than either British or French railways; consequently they cannot travel outside the tunnel and the two terminals at Coquelles and Folkestone. Each terminal is provided with a loop of track. After a train comes out of the tunnel, it goes round the loop and stops at the unloading / loading platform. It is then unloaded, and re-loaded with a new set of vehicles. It then starts the return journey through the tunnel.
The loop at Folkestone is clockwise, while the loop at Coquelles is anti-clockwise. This evens the wear on the wheels of the shuttle locomotives and vehicles, as each set (left or right) spends only half the time as the outer edge of the line.
Passenger vehicles are carried in a car shuttle train, made up of closed wagons. Half of the train (the rear rake) carries cars and other low vehicles in double-deck wagons, with the first and last two carriages of the section containing the access ramps. Coaches, buses and other high vehicles travel in the single-deck rake at the front of the train. In busy times, cars can also use this section.
Driver and passengers may leave their vehicles and walk along the train.
Eurotunnel occasionally run trains at 'half full', closing the top deck to reduce costs.
Toilets are provided in every third carriage in the double-deck section, and in the first and last carriages in the single-deck section.
Cyclists can use the Eurotunnel Shuttle to travel between Great Britain and France. This is achieved through the bicycles being housed in specially-adapted trailers and the cyclists travelling in a minibus.
Lorries are carried on semi-open wagons, with a separate passenger carriage at the front of the train for the drivers. This arrangement is a form of rolling highway, but operates over a much shorter distance than most rolling highways.
Safety regulations require two locomotives for all passenger trains through the tunnel (Shuttle and Eurostar), one at the front and one at the back, and both must be manned so that the train can be reversed out in case of a blockage. There are also attendants. In the case of the freight vehicle shuttles, the attendants ride in the passenger carriage at the front of the train with the lorry drivers; in the passenger vehicle shuttles, they patrol the train.
Passenger vehicle carriages are sealed off with fireproof doors and are pressurised. These doors are closed once all vehicles are loaded. They include smaller pedestrian doors that may be opened when the train is in motion to move from one carriage to the next but then close automatically.
Eurotunnel has been criticised for failing to implement measures to prevent or extinguish fires in the open framed large goods vehicle carrying wagons; recommendations made by the Fire Brigade Union in 1996 following a fire in the Channel Tunnel, that closed wagons should be used to prevent the spread of fire, were not acted upon.[2][3]
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