Geneva airport - French sector

zagmund

Does anyone know what the story is with access from the "French sector" of Geneva airport to the main part of the airport?

I'm finding it really hard to get hard and cold facts, even from the GVA website.

I eventually found out that "the French sector" is in the main building - it's just a little outpost of France a few hundred meters inside Switzerland linked by a road which only goes from France to there with no exits inside Switzerland. Originally I thought it was over on the north of the airfield, actually connected to France.

Anyhoo - I have to drop a car there, but it's not really clear what the story is once I have dropped it. I'm technically in France, but want to go to a hotel a couple of hundred meters away in Switzerland. Do I just walk through the airport, or do I have to go back out through France and come back in from the other side? I know it's pretty unlikely, but I presume there's a reason it's called "the French sector" and not "pier F where all the French flights go from".

Does anyone have practical experience of dropping a car in the French sector and flying from Switzerland/just walking into Switzerland?

z

zagmund

Good news to report, I think. On what must be an operational airport basis they don't let just anyone through from the French side to the Swiss side. The initial thing I read said that you could only get through if you had a ticket or a boarding card for a flight that day, but it turns out that you can also get through if you have a car hire contract from the French side, so that should be me sorted.

I had nightmare images of me dropping the car off in the French sector and then not being allowed to walk through the doorway between the two countries because in order to get my boarding card I need to check in and I can only check in on the other side of the door, and then me having to get a taxi for 10-15KM around the airport to travel 50m from where I started. The taxi drivers would love that one - not only a different city for the taximeter, this would be a whole new country. Kaching.

I knew it couldn't possibly be that crazy.

On a side note, some of the airport hotels on the French side have got the *worst* ever reviews that I have seen on TripAdvisor.

z

Wanaknowmore

Hi,
Just ensure you take the correct route to the French side of the airport. There are hire car returns for both swiss and French sides.

A colleague and i returned a car a few years ago during a snow storm and missed the route to the French side. We had to buy a yearly pass for the swiss motorway and then pay extra for returning the car on the swiss side. But after a nerve wrecking drive from Lyons in the snow, it could have been worse.

We stayed overnight at the Holiday Inn which has a shuttle bus service to/from the airport.

munchkin_utd

zagmund wrote: »

<snip>

On a side note, some of the airport hotels on the French side have got the *worst* ever reviews that I have seen on TripAdvisor.

z

indeed
http://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotels-g196701-Ferney_Voltaire_Ain_Rhone_Alpes-Hotels.html

bad form that the F1 is so bad. Normally a chain hotel would at least be clean and have clean sheets etc.

zagmund

Wanaknowmore wrote: »

Hi,
Just ensure you take the correct route to the French side of the airport. There are hire car returns for both swiss and French sides.

A colleague and i returned a car a few years ago during a snow storm and missed the route to the French side. We had to buy a yearly pass for the swiss motorway and then pay extra for returning the car on the swiss side. But after a nerve wrecking drive from Lyons in the snow, it could have been worse.

We stayed overnight at the Holiday Inn which has a shuttle bus service to/from the airport.

Thanks - from what I can tell the only route in to the French sector is to come in from the North, through Ferney Voltaire and under the runway. That's the route I'm planning on taking anyway. It's route C on this map - https://www.gva.ch/en/Portaldata/1/Resources/fichiers/publications/af.pdf.

z

zagmund

zagmund wrote: »

Thanks - from what I can tell the only route in to the French sector is to come in from the North, through Ferney Voltaire and under the runway. That's the route I'm planning on taking anyway. It's route C on this map - https://www.gva.ch/en/Portaldata/1/Resources/fichiers/publications/af.pdf.

z

Done it a few times its very easy to get through and a very short walk between the sides. Yep that is the way to drive in quite well signposted and easy for you to get access by the French side which is through a small road rather than the motorway. You can leave from the French side on arrival and you will see its quite easy crossing over into the Swiss side and to find way back on return.

zagmund

We came back through the French sector in GVA last week and boy was it a nightmare. From what I can tell, the Swiss side of the airport does everything it can to make access from the French side hard.

Transiting from the Swiss side to the French side is relatively easy - walk up to door, door opens, walk through door, door closes, next door opens, walk through . . . and you are in France.

From the French side to the Swiss side involves passing through a similar sort of set up, but trolleys don't fit through so you have to take all your bags off, carry them through the passageway, do a 180 in a confined space (try that with 4 suitcases, 2 pairs of skis and only 4 people or even worse with babies and buggies), go down a flight of stairs (no lift or escalator), walk through the arrivals hall, out into the main airport building, then back up to the floor you were on earlier and 20 or 30 minutes later you are in the Swiss side. For us it was a real mess. It's a pity that Swiss didn't have any manned check in desks on the French side as it would have saved us having to drag our luggage all the way through the airport.

Overall, coming from the south of Geneva, I reckon that getting back through the French sector added at least 60 minutes, but probably more like 90 or 120 to the experience from the time we hit St Julien on the edge of Geneva. I'm not convinced I would do it again, and I certainly wouldn't do it if times were tight in terms of getting to check in, etc . . .

In addition, even though they say that you can only get through with a boarding card or a car hire agreement, in fact you can only get through with a boarding card as the gate/door only opens when you scan your boarding card. You can't scan a car hire agreement. There were a couple of people there who appeared to be stuck in limbo - they weren't able to get through for one reason or another and when they pushed the "communications" button nobody answered. There were some "airport angels" there who eventually came over to talk to the stranded people, but they weren't able to do anything helpful like let them through the gates.

All in all, a bit of a mess. I thought Heathrow owned the prize for the least friendly transit mechanism, but I think the Geneva might be a contender.

z

munchkin_utd

zagmund wrote: »

<snip>
All in all, a bit of a mess. I thought Heathrow owned the prize for the least friendly transit mechanism, but I think the Geneva might be a contender.

z

good, its not just me that found Geneva a pain in the hole.

The swiss are just a funny shower to be honest. And outside of Switzerland Ive never seen a security check where they bring you into a cubicle and practically strip search you.
Completlely over the top, but then again, its officially the most anti foreigner country in europe and their recent anti immigration poll will mean them getting booted out of various trade and cross border agreements.

Their attitude seems to be that they are special, and the fact is that they are rich, so essentially they dont have to give a cr@p. And that attitude extends to their airport arrangements where essentiually they are doing you a favour to let you step on their soil in the first place.

Next time transit through Munich (T2) if at all possible and that will be a different experience. I only ever start or finish at the place which sortof nullifys its benefit to me as a great connecting hub.