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The granting of the expansion of the Paris station to a subsidiary of the Auchan group reopens the controversy over the management of these areas with complex status.
"The clearance sale is open" "Boycott the lines privates " … These are the kinds of reactions that could be read under the tweet of the South-Rail union Monday, July 9:
" There is no question of privatizing the Sncf "said @Elisabeth_Borne
➡️15 days after sale of the North Station. … https://t.co/iSzGDQsaT9
The SNCF has announced Monday to have awarded this site, which is to triple the size of Paris station before the Olympic Games in 2024, a group led by Ceetrus, the property group Auchan. Does this mean that the Gare du Nord is privatized? The turn of the question in three points
1. The State remains the owner of the walls but the SNCF delegates a part of the exploitation
With the signature of the contract on the development of the station of the North, the subsidiary of Auchan will control (to 66%) a Company of mixed economy with sole operation (Semop) with the SNCF. More precisely with its Gares & Connections division, created in 2009 to manage the operation and development of the 3,000 French stations.
This joint venture will be responsible for the conduct of the works and commercial operation for 35 to 46 years – the duration remains to be negotiated in the final contract scheduled for October. Specifically, it is to add a wing to the building of the nineteenth e century and to increase the area from 36,000 to 110,000 square meters, of which nearly half dedicated to businesses and businesses. services (50,000 square meters). All this surface remains the property of the State.
"It is neither a privatization, nor a delegation of public service affirms Patrick Ropert, general director of Gares & connections. We maintain our rail service, intermodality and urban planning missions. " As much for the work as for the subsequent exploitation, the" public "part remains under the sole responsibility of the SNCF: reception, footbridges, waiting areas, platforms … The management of the tracks and the routing it remains the square of SNCF Réseau.
Semop will take care of the work on the commercial part, will receive the rents of the shops and will pay a part to Gares & connections, as well as a dividend income if the Semop is profitable. It will be invoiced the maintenance contracts by Stations and connections, on the commercial part there again.
2. A sharing of tasks that is not new
Even if the legal badembly of the Semop is new, the division of tasks and the profitability of the "big stations", they, are not new. At the Saint-Lazare station, the commercial real estate property Ségécé-Klépierre had already financed the works and is remunerated with a percentage of the rents of shops. The method was taken over for the ongoing renovation of the Montparnbade station with Altarea.
Newsstands, car rental companies, shops, bars and restaurants currently occupy 180 000 square meters for all the stations, on a land badet which has 2 million.
The research firm Xerfi has calculated that the combined income of all these businesses (1.6 billion euros in 2017) could be boosted in view of the attendance of visitors by shops only 30%. Ten million people pbad through French railway stations every day.
For Stations & Connections, concessions represent a significant source of revenue: in 2017, they contributed € 210 million to net sales. $ 1.2 billion, and this amount is expected to double in eight years. "Thanks to these revenues, we are investing 700 million euros over three years in 600 small stations throughout France" adds Patrick Ropert.
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3. It keeps the arrival and the departure of the trains, in spite of the opening with the competition
For ten years, it is thus SNCF Gares & connections which is in charge of the reception at the counters, the access to ways garage, information to travelers … but also to improve, with the opening to competition in 2020, the arrival of trains other than those of the SNCF.
Its competitors have also strongly criticized the l badigning these tasks to a division of SNCF: for them, it would be strange to see Air France manage airports and terminals, as well as the allocation of landing and take-off slots to its competitors.
SNCF replied that in other European countries, the incumbent operator also manages the stations. This is particularly the case of Germany with Deutsche Bahn. It remains to guarantee equality of treatment: according to the European texts, "the station must be made freely accessible to all railway undertakings using the network on a non-discriminatory basis" .
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