The Ligure was an international

express train An express train is a type of passenger train that makes a small number of stops between its origin and destination stations, usually major destinations, allowing faster service than Local train, local trains that stop at most or all of the s ...

operated by the

Italian Railways The Italian railway system is one of the most important parts of the infrastructure of Italy, with a total length of of which active lines are 16,723 km. The network has recently grown with the construction of the new high-speed rail netw ...

linking

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...

with the

Côte d'Azur The French Riviera (known in French as the ; oc, Còsta d'Azur ; literal translation " Azure Coast") is the Mediterranean coastline of the southeast corner of France. There is no official boundary, but it is usually considered to extend fro ...

. The train was named after the Italian region

Liguria Liguria (; lij, Ligûria ; french: Ligurie) is a Regions of Italy, region of north-western Italy; its Capital city, capital is Genoa. Its territory is crossed by the Alps and the Apennine Mountains, Apennines Mountain chain, mountain range and is ...

which was served by the train.

Trans Europ Express

The Ligure was planned to be one of the initial

TEE A tee is a stand used in sport to support and elevate a stationary ball prior to striking with a foot, club or bat. Tees are used extensively in golf, tee-ball, baseball, American football, and rugby. Etymology The word tee is derived from the ...

services at the start of the network at 2 June 1957. However the rolling stock was late itself and the service couldn't start before 12 August 1957. Initially the service linked

with

Marseille Marseille ( , , ; also spelled in English as Marseilles; oc, Marselha ) is the prefecture of the French department of Bouches-du-Rhône and capital of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region. Situated in the camargue region of southern Franc ...

calling at several cities, as

Genoa Genoa ( ; it, Genova ; lij, Zêna ). is the capital of the Italian region of Liguria and the List of cities in Italy, sixth-largest city in Italy. In 2015, 594,733 people lived within the city's administrative limits. As of the 2011 Italian ce ...

Monaco Monaco (; ), officially the Principality of Monaco (french: Principauté de Monaco; Ligurian: ; oc, Principat de Mónegue), is a sovereign city-state and microstate on the French Riviera a few kilometres west of the Italian region of Lig ...

and

Nice Nice ( , ; Niçard: , classical norm, or , nonstandard, ; it, Nizza ; lij, Nissa; grc, Νίκαια; la, Nicaea) is the prefecture of the Alpes-Maritimes department in France. The Nice agglomeration extends far beyond the administrative c ...

and tourist resorts along the Mediterranean coast. The Aln 442-448

diesel multiple units A diesel multiple unit or DMU is a multiple-unit train powered by on-board diesel engines. A DMU requires no separate locomotive, as the engines are incorporated into one or more of the carriages. Diesel-powered single-unit railcars are also ...

attracted more and more passengers over the years and by 1966 the train was coupled with an Ale-840 on the Italian stretch to cope with the raising number of travellers. TEE Ligure

In 1969 the route was prolonged further west to

Avignon Avignon (, ; ; oc, Avinhon, label=Provençal dialect, Provençal or , ; la, Avenio) is the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Vaucluse Departments of France, department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur Regions of France, region of So ...

in order to provide a TEE link between

and

Barcelona Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within ci ...

using the newly introduced TEE Catalan Talgo and the TEE Ligure. The timetable was changed in a way that passengers could change from the Catalan Talgo to the Ligure and vice versa in Avignon at around 3 p.m. The formation was changed as well to two Aln 442-448 coupled between Milan and Nice. Timetable in 1971 (France and Monaco are in Central European time zone, Italy at that time in the Eastern European time zone, the real travel time between Monaco and Ventimiglia is 17 minutes) On 1 October 1972 the rolling stock was replaced by Gran Conforto coaches hauled by an electric locomotive class E 444.

Intercity

On 22 May 1982 the route was shortened to Milan - Nice. La Légende des TEE p. 198. At the same time 2nd-class coaches were introduced and the train was transformed into an

Intercity InterCity (commonly abbreviated ''IC'' on timetables and tickets) is the classification applied to certain long-distance passenger train services in Europe. Such trains (in contrast to regional, local, or commuter trains) generally call at m ...

service with 16 stops. It didn't met the

EuroCity EuroCity, abbreviated as EC, is a cross-border train category within the European inter-city rail network. In contrast to trains allocated to the lower-level "IC" (InterCity) category, EC trains are international services that meet 20 criteri ...

criteria and it lasted until 2005 before the

label was granted. In December 2009 the Ligure was withdrawn.

References

Notes

Works cited

* * * * *

External links