Commuting from Alsace to Basel

Transportation, Travel and Trips
1
Dear all,

I'm planning to continue my studies in Basel. However, I'm thinking about moving to Alsace region in France and to commute daily. Is there any viable way by train (especially) or maybe even car to do so? Which are your experiences?

Thank you a lot in advance

2
Welcome to EF, where self-help is admired and appreciated:

http://www.sbb.ch/en/home.html

3
What a kind welcome. I can read and in fact I read the whole website of TER Alsace (and I don't understand how SBB is related to my question, but yes I've read also there). I find the information quite contradicting... It says that there are subscriptions that are also valid for Basel, but I can't even look up the prices in their system. That's why I was asking for personal experiences/recommendations.

4
Which part of Alsace are you thinking of? There are frequent regional trains to Basel from Mulhouse, stopping off at St Louis and a few other places on the way.

From the sncf Alsace website it looks like they do student tickets. Here's an example of what a monthly student ticket from Mulhouse to Basel St. Johann station would cost:

http://www.ter.sncf.com/alsace/tarifs/devis/resultats

If you want more precise details, your best bet would be to phone or go to a French train station in Alsace and ask directly. Might be a good idea to go and see if you like the place before making plans to move there anyway :-) ...

5

What nationality are you? If non-EU you wouldn’t be able to move to France and commute. Your Swiss permit means you have to live in the canton that issued your permit and nowhere else. If you’re EU then it’s not a problem - unless you should have a G permit instead of a B.

6
OK, So you claim to be able to read a railway timetable; can you also read a map? Consider where, in relation to Basel, Alsace starts, and where, some hundreds of kilometres to the North, it ends.

So is there any way you could make your question less clear?

7
@thewandererreturns: Thanks a lot! Apparently it works with Basel St. Johann, but I haven't found the same offer for Basel SBB (while the former is not a direct connection and the latter is ). Also, I did indeed write them asking about this stuff, so let's see what they'll answer.

@Medea Fleecestealer: I'm a EU citizen, so I think I shouldn't have any issues relocating in France. This is probably another issue to figure out, but honestly right now I'm more concerned with the transport. If that fails, everything else fails.

@Ace1: Mulhouse could be an option but so could any other town or city (I don't have a fixed plan yet). Right now I just wanna check this option in general and I'm pretty uncertain about the whole plan. The only thing I know is that I visited Basel and didn't feel at ease there.