Thread by @jonworth

In February I've been invited to an event about night trains to/from Berlin...

... so today I started to wonder what runs, and what could run in future

Berlin Hbf pic source: flickr.com/photos/3093297…

My criteria for future routes: it'd have to be doable with a 200km/h locomotive hauled night train, and that locomotive would need ETCS

Something like this:
railjournal.com/locomotives/ra…

What night trains does Berlin have already?

NightJet 456 / 457
Berlin - Wroclaw 🇵🇱 - Wien 🇦🇹 (- Graz 🇦🇹 in summertime)

EN 40457 / 40476
Berlin - Wroclaw 🇵🇱 - Bratislava 🇸🇰 - Budapest 🇭🇺

NightJet 470 / 471
Berlin - Freiburg(Breisgau) 🇩🇪 - Basel 🇨🇭 - Zürich 🇨🇭

Snälltåget 300 / 301
Berlin - Hamburg 🇩🇪 - København 🇩🇰 - Malmö 🇸🇪 - Stockholm 🇸🇪 (seasonal)

What is planned?

Summer 2022
European Sleeper
Bruxelles 🇧🇪 - Amsterdam 🇳🇱 - Berlin - Praha 🇨🇿

December 2023
Berlin - Mannheim 🇩🇪 (train splits)
One part: Köln 🇩🇪 - Liège 🇧🇪 - Bruxelles 🇧🇪
Other part: Saarbrücken 🇩🇪 - Metz 🇫🇷 - Paris 🇫🇷

What has been floated as an idea?

Re-routing of the Wien night train via Praha - so:
Berlin - Dresden 🇩🇪 - Praha 🇨🇿 - Brno 🇨🇿 - Wien 🇦🇹 (could also extend to Budapest 🇭🇺)

But then - and this is where it gets interesting - what could work, in terms of times and operations?

Hamburg 🇩🇪 - Berlin - Poznan 🇵🇱 (train splits)
One part: Warszawa 🇵🇱 - Bialystok 🇵🇱 (even Kaunas 🇱🇹)
Other part: Krakow 🇵🇱 - Przemysl 🇵🇱

Berlin - Hamburg 🇩🇪 - Flensburg 🇩🇪 - København 🇩🇰 - Malmö 🇸🇪 - Göteborg 🇸🇪

Berlin - Halle 🇩🇪 - Erfurt 🇩🇪 - Strasbourg 🇫🇷 - Mulhouse 🇫🇷 - Besançon 🇫🇷 - Lyon 🇫🇷

Berlin - Halle 🇩🇪 - Erfurt 🇩🇪 - Innsbruck 🇦🇹 - Verona 🇮🇹 (and continuing to Bologna 🇮🇹, Milano 🇮🇹 or Venezia 🇮🇹)

Berlin - Halle 🇩🇪 - Erfurt 🇩🇪 - Salzburg 🇦🇹 - Villach 🇦🇹 - Ljubljana 🇸🇮 - Zagreb or Rijeka 🇭🇷

And a further Wien route...

Berlin - Salzburg 🇦🇹 - Linz 🇦🇹 - Wien 🇦🇹

Please note the limits here: I have simply aimed to work out viable routes and timetables. I do not know the market potential of these, and indeed finding anyone to run them would be harder still

But take these as *what's possible*

I will publish all my workings in due course, and the more detailed theoretical timetables, but the summary is this:
4️⃣ routes exist
2️⃣ are planned to launch
7️⃣ more would be feasible, in terms of operations and timetables

/ends

P.S. Paris-Berlin-Moscow is not covered here - it was suspended due to COVID. But it transits Belarus. So due to the political situation I doubt it will return swiftly after the pandemic abates…