After being suspended in April , the rail highway service between France and Italy will restart at the end of 2025. The good news for combined transport was shared by Paolo Foietta, President of the Italy-France Intergovernmental Commission for the Turin-Lyon railway line, with RailFreight.com.
The service, also known as the Alpine Rail Highway (AFA), was officially interrupted four months ago, but in practice it has not been running for over two years now. These operations, as all other rail services along the Frejus axis, were halted in August 2023 after a massive landslide near St. Jean de Maurienne closed the line for 19 months.
These developments seemed to be the nail in the coffin for AFA, which was not able to restart once the line reopened in April 2025. “We fought intensely to restart the service, I will always defend AFA”, Poietta said, “it will be once again operational at the end of the year”. He also underlined the importance of subsidies for rail highway services such as this one, especially considering the current issues with cross-border infrastructure
‘It is a disadvantaged line’
The AFA service connects Orbassano, near Turin, to Aiton, not too far from Grenoble. The line, also known as the Frejus line, was built in the second half of the 1800s and cannot guarantee safe passage for all trains, Poietta argued. Moreover, the trains deployed for this initiative carry half the wagons than other similar ones but need one additional locomotive due to the steepness of the line.
“The demand for rail freight services along this axis is increasing, but we do not have the proper infrastructure to run more trains, forcing customers to choose the road”, Foietta stressed. These opportunities will not be seized until the Base Tunnel of the Turin-Lyon project is complete and a significant modal shift can happen, he added.