Good news for travellers arriving at Charles de Gaulle airport and looking for the quickest way to reach the centre of Paris. Plans for a new express rail link between the airport and the Gare de l’Est mainline train station in central Paris have finally been approved. The aim is to provide a high-quality service comparable to that available in other capital cities in Europe and elsewhere.

Travel time on the “CDG Express” will be cut to 20 minutes, compared with around 35 minutes now using line B of the RER network which carries commuters from the northern suburbs of Paris. Trains will run every 15 minutes. The bad news — the new line is not due to open until 2024.

The project had stirred heated debate due to plans to levy a one-euro tax on airline tickets to help finance the project, whose cost is estimated at €1.7bn. It had been estimated that this tax would raise up to €240m over the next seven years. Air France complained that the tax would represent €17m in 2017 alone.

In the end, the government agreed to push back implementation of the ticket tax until the express link enters service in 2024. An alternative source of funds until that time has yet to be identified.