A Federal Railways spokeswoman told the Swiss News Agency Keystone-ATS that over the next five years the company would have to spend CHF1.4 million on analyses carried out by a specialist company and CHF3.5 million on cleaning up and eliminating the substances. She was confirming a report in the German-language CH Media newspapers.

Analyses of substances harmful to users have been standard practice for years, she added. Questioned on Friday on the sidelines of a press conference on the RER, Director Vincent Ducrot stated that“there is no question of asbestos contamination. This is a routine check. There are no concrete suspicions”.

+ Asbestos removal work still progressing slowly in Switzerland

According to the Federal Railways, there is currently no danger to passengers or employees. As long as the parts containing asbestos have not deteriorated, no harmful substances have been released. The samples are also taken in areas to which passengers have no access.

The use of asbestos as a construction material has been banned in Switzerland since 1990. It presents a health hazard when its fibres are released and inhaled.

Translated from French by DeepL/ts

We select the most relevant news for an international audience and use automatic translation tools to translate them into English. A journalist then reviews the translation for clarity and accuracy before publication.

Providing you with automatically translated news gives us the time to write more in-depth articles. The news stories we select have been written and carefully fact-checked by an external editorial team from news agencies such as Bloomberg or Keystone.

If you have any questions about how we work, write to us at ...

In compliance with the JTI standards

More: SWI swissinfo certified by the Journalism Trust Initiati

You can find an overview of ongoing debates with our journalists here. Please join us!

If you want to start a conversation about a topic raised in this article or want to report factual errors, email us at ....