The IC1 line
The train that crosses the Plateau, from Geneva to St. Gallen, by way of Lausanne, Bern and Zurich.
On 12 December 1982, the big Swiss stations start keeping time: every hour, the train to a given town leaves on the same minute past the hour. Wikipedia dates the clock-face timetable from that day, and with it the InterCity network still in use. Among the first five lines, one already runs from Geneva to St. Gallen, across the whole Plateau.
The route
The IC1 links six cantonal capitals, from Geneva to St. Gallen by way of Lausanne, Fribourg, Bern and then Zurich. In the current timetable, as listed by Wikipedia, it starts at Geneva Airport and also stops at Renens, Zurich Oerlikon, Zurich’s airport, Winterthur, then at Wil, Uzwil, Flawil and Gossau before its terminus. So it serves the airports of Geneva and Zurich.
A country on the hour
The principle fits in one idea: trains that meet in the big stations at fixed minutes, hour after hour, so that connections wait for each other there. For that to work, the encyclopedia reminds us, getting from one hub to the next must take a whole number of half-hours, stops included; the SBB therefore had to win minutes on Lausanne–Bern as on Zurich–St. Gallen. This is the Rail 2000 programme, which the people approve in 1987. Its first stage is finished in December 2004: it includes the high-speed stretch built between Mattstetten and Rothrist, where trains reach 200 kilometres an hour, and brings Bern–Zurich under the hour.
The trains
In 1982, an InterCity stood out mostly for its air-conditioned coaches, still rare in Switzerland back then. Rail 2000 then brought double-deck coaches, the IC 2000. Since December 2020, according to Wikipedia, double-deck trains built by Bombardier have taken the place of more than one IC 2000 in two on the IC1.
On the map
The map keeps only the essentials: six stations, from Geneva to St. Gallen, and two red trains shuttling back and forth without end, with no name and no logo. The airports, Renens, Oerlikon, Winterthur and the small stations of the canton of St. Gallen are not stops there. And time is squeezed: a train runs from one end to the other far faster than in real life. The vehicles on the map are there for play: they keep to no timetable and don’t show where the real ones are. To travel, check the official timetables; and if you’d like the map to do more, write to us, our links are at the top of the page.
Sources: Wikipedia (French), articles “InterCity (Suisse)” and “Rail 2000”.