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Germany's 49-euro ticket resulted in significant shift from road to rail

mcc-berlin.net

51–60 of 910 posts

Re: Germany's 49-euro ticket resulted in significant shift from road to rail

#51

Didn’t this start as unlimited anywhere for 9 euros no strings attached? I LOVE the German transit system (although Denmark wins in cleanliness). However, Germany is a bit predatory with this new system. You can ONLY purchase this ticket as a subscription model. If you’re a tourist, you must cancel before the 10th of the month or you get auto rebilled. Additionally, there are so many apps that resell the ticket as so…

"I LOVE the German transit system" I have some experience with the public transport systems in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France and Belgium. In my opinion Germany's is the worst. Everything seems to be stuck in paper based processes, only occasionally and very listlessly digitized. The tariffs (apart from the Deutschlandticket) are overly complicated and suffer heavily under the common balkanization. The DB Navi…

I can't tell for other countries, but SNCF digital solutions have been a great example of everything you should not do for as long as I can remember. Actually bahn.de used to be a far better interface to consult french train hours than whatever fancy new name SNCF would come every few months or so.

Re: Germany's 49-euro ticket resulted in significant shift from road to rail

#52
post #18

Didn’t this start as unlimited anywhere for 9 euros no strings attached? I LOVE the German transit system (although Denmark wins in cleanliness). However, Germany is a bit predatory with this new system. You can ONLY purchase this ticket as a subscription model. If you’re a tourist, you must cancel before the 10th of the month or you get auto rebilled. Additionally, there are so many apps that resell the ticket as so…

> Didn’t this start as unlimited anywhere for 9 euros no strings attached? That was a time limited earlier ticket. "The tickets were valid for June, July, or August 2022. The offer aimed at reducing energy use amid the 2021–2022 global energy crisis." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9-Euro-Ticket It influenced the idea to come up with a permanent ticket: the "Deutschlandticket". It started 1. Mai 2023. https://en.wikip…

I only pay 20 EUR a month because a 25 EUR subsidy by my employer. It is a total nobrainer although, I often even use it less, just because I can jump on any local train, tram, bus without worrying about a ticket (particularly as we don't have NFC payment). Actually the 9 EUR will effectively mean a 50% raise for me, so I am not sure if the raise even makes sense economically because people like me just would cancel.

Re: Germany's 49-euro ticket resulted in significant shift from road to rail

#53
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I LOVE the German transit system" I have some experience with the public transport systems in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France and Belgium. In my opinion Germany's is the worst. Everything seems to be stuck in paper based processes, only occasionally and very listlessly digitized. The tariffs (apart from the Deutschlandticket) are overly complicated and suffer heavily under the common balkanization. The DB Navi…

>Everything seems to be stuck in paper based processes I want to buy a ticket every now and then. I want that process to be straight forward: cash money for one-time ticket. I don't want your app on my phone, I don't want a subscription, and I don't want to be tracked. Paper based offline processes forever, please.

lol you know websites exist right. what a luddite approach. Paper is expensive, wasteful, environmentally harmful, and time consuming.

Re: Germany's 49-euro ticket resulted in significant shift from road to rail

#54
post #18

Didn’t this start as unlimited anywhere for 9 euros no strings attached? I LOVE the German transit system (although Denmark wins in cleanliness). However, Germany is a bit predatory with this new system. You can ONLY purchase this ticket as a subscription model. If you’re a tourist, you must cancel before the 10th of the month or you get auto rebilled. Additionally, there are so many apps that resell the ticket as so…

> Didn’t this start as unlimited anywhere for 9 euros no strings attached? That was a time limited earlier ticket. "The tickets were valid for June, July, or August 2022. The offer aimed at reducing energy use amid the 2021–2022 global energy crisis." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9-Euro-Ticket It influenced the idea to come up with a permanent ticket: the "Deutschlandticket". It started 1. Mai 2023. https://en.wikip…

It sounds amazing. All these prices seem crazy low. A significantly zone limited monthly commuter ticket here in Denmark costs over 500€

Re: Germany's 49-euro ticket resulted in significant shift from road to rail

#55

As someone that avoids the german rail at all costs I applaud this move, the freer the roads and airports are for me, the better.

Exactly. I don't understand why most car owners are so opposed to public transport.

It takes forever compared to driving in most cases, catching the transit often involves a walk, and a lot of public transit is kind of grungy. This doesn't apply or matter as much in some cases (e.g. the NY subway) but in general it's not great, at least not in the USA.

Re: Germany's 49-euro ticket resulted in significant shift from road to rail

#56

Well, of course, if we didn't have traffic ministers again and again, who do everything they can to make rail less attractive and road more attractive, then we could probably have a great system. But automobile lobby is so strong, they buy all the politicians in that role, probably even before they land in that role, so I guess normal people will have to keep suffering, so that those politicians can have a life of lu…

Automobile lobby? That's BS. The German rail system has been cost-saved to death, it now barely handles the increased passenger volume as a result of the D-Ticket. Overcrowded trains, even more delays and train cancellations (b/c of insufficient staff coverage, malfunctioning doors, etc.) even with S-Bahn trains are getting out of hand. "Transitwende" my ass! Same with the "Energiewende".

How i envy the Dutch and Belgian transport situation!

Re: Germany's 49-euro ticket resulted in significant shift from road to rail

#57
post #50

Didn’t this start as unlimited anywhere for 9 euros no strings attached? I LOVE the German transit system (although Denmark wins in cleanliness). However, Germany is a bit predatory with this new system. You can ONLY purchase this ticket as a subscription model. If you’re a tourist, you must cancel before the 10th of the month or you get auto rebilled. Additionally, there are so many apps that resell the ticket as so…

I'm a big fan of public transit, but it's not entirely "baffling" why the US lags European countries (and Japan) - the US is a MUCH larger country.

There’s a happy medium somewhere though and the US doesn’t meet it at all. I can’t even take a bus from my neighborhood in a California city to the grocery store in a timely manner and it’s often cancelled

Re: Germany's 49-euro ticket resulted in significant shift from road to rail

#58
post #44
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Everything seems to be stuck in paper based processes, only occasionally and very listlessly digitized. That's nonsense. Most public transport is digital by now. > The DB Navigator is so terrible It's not terrible. I managed to book all my train travels just fine with it, also using a business bahncard which gives me a 50% discount on all trains.

I couldn't pay for my ubahn with a credit card on the bahn, and the app required me to use some kind of a paypal derivative. I did not pay. Regardless of whether it is digitized or not, regional trains suck. To pay on the train, I think I was forced to use cash. Further, the process for getting refunds when you miss a connection requires one to fill in forms on paper and scan them in and then send in via email. Or wa…

Pay before. That's how the transport systems generally work in Germany. In many trains you need to have a ticket BEFORE entering the train and also BEFORE entering the platform in the train station.

> Further, the process for getting refunds when you miss a connection requires one to fill in forms on paper and scan them in and then send in via email.

I can do that in the DB app.

Re: Germany's 49-euro ticket resulted in significant shift from road to rail

#59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Germany is smaller than California. The United States is very, very large place, mostly unpopulated. It’s hard to apply whatever Germany, a small, densely populated country does to the US, which is largely empty land.

Why do we have to pretend that routes between Montana and South Dakota have to come up when discussing ways of improving rail usage in the US? We could treat routes between Chicago, Milwaukee, and Indianapolis like Germany. We could treat high speed rail in California or the Northeast like Japan. Choosing to live in an extremely rural area shouldn't just be a "well it doesn't help" me trump card to defeat things that…

The politics at the national level are likely to be that states not helped by this vote against it.

Re: Germany's 49-euro ticket resulted in significant shift from road to rail

#60
post #11

As someone that avoids the german rail at all costs I applaud this move, the freer the roads and airports are for me, the better.

Why do you avoid the rail system?

Not exactly hard to nowadays in Germany

Using the rail system? Now that’s a trick and a half.

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