Sleeper trains making a comeback in Europe?

Europe is again resorting to sleeper trains.

Sleeper trains have faced tough competition from low-cost airlines in recent years. However, there are plans to revive them in Europe as the demand from passengers is quite high.

According to the plan, at least six new routes are being launched across Europe this year. One of the routes includes the Brussels to Prague sleeper train.

The train will be run by a private company aiming to turn a profit.

“Sleeper trains are the most difficult to make work commercially,” said Mark Smith, who runs the travel website The Man in Seat 61.

“You’ve got 20 or 30 people in beds, whereas in the same coach if it had seats and on a daytime train, you could get 70 people in.”

He said that the demand for sleeper trains had always been there. However, there were also challenges like finding proper night train coaches and addressing capacity issues.

“There's a huge lack of proper night train coaches at the moment in Europe,” said Chris Engelsman, one of the co-founders of European Sleeper, the company behind this new service.

“There’s nothing around, I mean the railways haven't been investing in night trains for decades.”

Responding to the capacity challenges, André Aschwanden from the Swiss Tourism Office said, "It is a small market."

“It's a niche. There is one train per night, and a lot of tourists are still flying in.”

The growing demand for greener travel options in Europe contributes to the revival of sleeper services. However, given the issues facing night trains, the travel revolution seems a far cry.