The chief executive of Eurostar has made it clear it the company has no plans to bring back international trains to Ashford. The service to Europe was halted during the pandemic in 2020.
Interviewed in The Times on Saturday October 18 Gwendoline Cazenave, who has been Eurostar CEO since 2022, said she had no interest in resurrecting the service at Ashford International. "We are about city centre to city centre," she said, explaining that stops in between would slow the service down.
Instead the company is prioritising links between London St Pancras and cities like Frankfurt or Geneva.
A spokesperson for Eurostar said pre-pandemic only small numbers of passengers were using their services at Ashford International. "Our Kent stations will remain closed throughout 2025 and will be reviewed in 2026. We understand that this may be frustrating, and we want to stress that we are closely monitoring the situation and, should there be any changes, we will provide an update.”
Last week MPs called on Eurostar to return international trains to Ashford during a Westminster debate on Tuesday October 14. Hastings and Rye MP Helena Dollimore described Ashford International as a ghost station and said the company had "a moral responsibility to the areas that it promised to serve."
A number of companies have come forward hoping to break Eurostar's monopoly of the high speed rail line, with one promising to restart services to and from Ashford.
This autumn, the Office of Road and Rail will decide whether to allow other operators to use the Temple Mills International Depot in East London which is currently the only place Channel Tunnel trains can be serviced.
