> I don't think we're talking about the same country here.
> Are you a regular user ?
Not OP, but I am. The French railway system suffers from a few faults (like the fact that it's Paris first, or not enough capacity on some routes, especially around popular times like Friday afternoon), but is otherwise extremely good. There's very fast coverage between all big cities aligned to Paris (so Lille - Lyon - Marseille is super fast, but mostly because they are destinations linked to Paris); Marseille - Bordeaux is slow because it isn't aligned to Paris, and has to pass through bad terrain in the middle of nowhere).
In terms of coverage of % of the population with regional or high speed rail, or hell, low cost low or high speed rail, it's among the best in the world. It's only serious challengers are Spain, Italy, Japan, China.
> Are you a regular user ?
Not OP, but I am. The French railway system suffers from a few faults (like the fact that it's Paris first, or not enough capacity on some routes, especially around popular times like Friday afternoon), but is otherwise extremely good. There's very fast coverage between all big cities aligned to Paris (so Lille - Lyon - Marseille is super fast, but mostly because they are destinations linked to Paris); Marseille - Bordeaux is slow because it isn't aligned to Paris, and has to pass through bad terrain in the middle of nowhere).
In terms of coverage of % of the population with regional or high speed rail, or hell, low cost low or high speed rail, it's among the best in the world. It's only serious challengers are Spain, Italy, Japan, China.