French TGV, is it punctual? reliable?

I%26#39;m considering a trip back from Lyon, France to Charles de Gaulle airport by TGV, arrving at 10:04 and expecting a flight to catch at 11:50.

I was wondering if I should reconsider.

I appreciate any comments or suggestions.

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Yes TGV has a good ontime record. It isnt bothered much by weather. However, all bets are off if there is a strike. Fortunately, the unions schedule strikes in advance with both a begin and end date / time. This would allow you to make other plans.

However, 1h45 mins could be tight if checking in for an international flight. Are you flying back to the US? If so what airline? What terminal? What class?

You understand that if you are late you are at the airlines mercy basically. They could take pity on you and let you fly the next day for a small fee or depending on your fare class, you could lose your ticket all together ... Food for though.

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Our experience with the French railway system (TGV, SNCF, etc.) has also been very good: punctual and reliable, except of course when there is a strike as mentioned by the other TA poster. I guess I would be a little more concerned about your having just under 2 hours for checking in for presumably an international flight back to the US. You probably will be okay, but then again depending on the time of day and your airline, etc., there may be lines at the ticket counters and at the security checkpoints. If you have some sort of an elite frequent flyer with your airline, that actually will help. We used the elite check-in with ours and things went pretty smoothly this past Friday at CDG.

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Hi --

If you are indeed about to fly back to the US, you%26#39;ll need a minimum of 3 hours lead time for check in before your flight. For a mid-day flight, I%26#39;d want 4 hours.

Your airline will have a time selected at which they will shut down new check ins for your flight, and begin to give the unoccupied seats to passengers with stand by status. There is nothing you can do to reverse this process, so be sure to check with your airline about your grace time.

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3 to 4 hours is excessive IMHO. 2 hours is fairly standard. I%26#39;ve never seen a situation where I couldnt complete check-in / security etc and get to the plane in 2 hours and i%26#39;ve flown in and out of CDG many times. With internet check-in, fast bag drops and kiosks the process has improved. Also, if push comes to shove and it looks to be taking to long you simply make yourself known and they will check you in.

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Thank you for the valuable info. Greatly appreciated.

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