It was a great year for railway operator Eurostar as it more than doubled its profits, earning £52 million, and yet the British government is looking to unload its 40 percent share as part of an overall privatization campaign that hopes to sell off millions of pounds of government owned assets, everything from the Post Office to the BBC Channel 4.

Though the British share of Eurostar figures to fetch billions of pounds, the plan ignites the same set of controversies in Great Britain that privatization does here.

Among European rail players, there’s little concern about the plan because the likely buyer is the French state rail firm, SNCF, which already controls the majority of Eurostar’s shares.

As ACP Rail vice president Tim Roebuck said, it’s just “a small residual U.K. part, and likely acquired by SNCF, who control it anyway.”

“I don’t expect there to be any changes that would impact customers, because French Rail is already operating the line," said Frederic Langlois, Rail Europe’s president & CEO.

The British government also recently allowed Eurostar to enter a bid for Britain’s state-owned East Coast mainline.

If Eurostar’s summer service to Avignon is deemed a success the service may begin running all-year in 2015. As it is the weekly train to the south of France will operate in 2014 from June 28 to Sept. 13, offering a boon to the winter weary British traveler.

The seasonal spring service to Lyon, Avignon and Aix-en-Provence was very popular offering quick breaks. Eurostar will begin direct service to Amsterdam in 2016.

Plans to put another rail line in the Chunnel to compete with Eurostar are also gathering momentum. The Channel Tunnel issued a 'Certificate B' operating license to Deutsche Bahn (DB), the German rail line. DB has for year’s coveted the notion of high-speed service between Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Köln and London.

“There was a great deal of energy for this before the economic collapse of 2008/2009, but after that rail lines became much more conservative about their planning," Langlois said.

“DB wants to run routes like London/Koln and beyond,” Roebuck said. "But due to safety cases and lack of the complex train kit needed to operate tunnel routes, we are looking at 2016 earliest.”

 “Of course more competition is always better because it improves service standards,” Langlois said. "Eurostar is already planning to upgrade its fleet. Look at what happened in Italy when NTV began competing with Trenitalia, service got better all around.”