Eurostar says that increased capacity to check passengers at London St Pancras means that it now caps very few trains.
The increases feature more border police examining passports, more automatic check-in gates, and a ‘SmartCheck’ facial recognition scheme that allows passengers to pass only one rather than two passport checks.
Earlier this year, Eurostar admitted that it could not run full trains from St Pancras because checks took too long, which led to queues of passengers around the station. Now, Chief Executive Gwendoline Cazenave says that while passenger numbers remain challenging, with more than 18,000 per day, very few trains remain capped.
Speaking at the launch of Eurostar’s new advertisement campaign in London on October 9, she could not commit to relaunching services from Ebbsfleet and Ashford station (and Calais…