Rail traffic will be “normal this weekend” with “some localized disruptions” due to a switchers’ strike, SNCF management announced Wednesday February 21.
The switchers, responsible for regulating traffic on the network, are called to stop work by Sud-Rail on Friday February 23 and Saturday February 24, a week after a very successful controllers’ strike which led to the cancellation of a train on two on the main lines. These dates have the particularity of being common to the three school holiday zones A, B and C.
Switchers are called to mobilize to demand “a real massive hiring plan”, an “increase in the operational circulation bonus” to 300 euros compared to 60 euros currently and questions of work organization with more predictable schedules, according to Julien Troccaz, Sud-Rail federal secretary. “The mobilization risks being significant in the Alps, the Paris region or New Aquitaine,” Mr. Troccaz warned on Tuesday.
As for SNCF Réseau, the infrastructure manager, we assure you that the company has made recruitment efforts in recent years, going from 508 hires in 2020 to 654 in 2022, then 902 in 2023.
During the last switchers’ strike in December 2022, around fifty TGVs out of 1,300 were canceled during the first weekend of the Christmas holidays.
