It now appears that Eurostar may finally be seeing some signs of recovery. In total, 2.6 million passengers have used the service that the company provides in this quarter. This is compared to the 2.4 million a year ago. The sales are believed to be helped out by the growth in the leisure market. However, there has been a bottoming out in the business travel market as well.

Some experts do point out that they think that some of this growth could be due to the fire on a shuttle that took place in Channel Tunnel last September in the third quarter of 2008. Thus, due to the drop in demand during that time, it could have caused this year’s numbers to look a bit better. The ticket sales between January and September of 2009 have totaled more than £504.9 million. On top of this, since the start of the year Eurostar has already welcomed 6.9 million travelers.

Richard Brown, the company’s chief executive, said that the figures that have been released just recently show that, despite the hard times, people are increasingly realizing the great benefits of traveling with Eurostar. Brown continued by saying that these individuals are part of what he calls the Eurostar Generation. These are travelers who, over the past decade and a half, have experienced significant changes to their lives thanks to the growth of high speed rails.

Brown did say that the market does remain very rough, but they are seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. He said that in recent weeks, a number of their major corporate clients have eased their business travel restrictions. This could be a sign of an upturn.