Berlin The new traffic light coalition will find it difficult to achieve its ambitious climate goals in the transport sector. Leading transport economists are convinced of this. The reason for the acceptance are the plans of the SPD, Greens and FDP. Contrary to initial considerations, there should be no rail reform. However, significantly more traffic should be handled via the rail network instead of by road and air.
Professor Andreas Knorr of the University of Administrative Sciences in Speyer described the plan to bundle the DB Netz and DB Station and Service divisions alone and run them under the umbrella of Deutsche Bahn AG for the common good as “cosmetics”.
Professor Gernot Sieg from the University of Münster complained that the discussed “sensible separation of the rail infrastructure from the DB Group” is not coming after all. This would create “neither efficiency nor transparency”.
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Professor Kay Mitusch from the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology also sees it that way. “You don’t dare to make big leaps, such as the complete privatization of individual transport sectors,” complained the network economist. Thus “the unbearable information monopoly of the DB remains untouched”.
The network agency should strictly regulate the railway
Mitusch, who like his colleagues is a member of the scientific advisory board of the Federal Ministry of Transport, is now calling for tough regulation. “At least the regulator should be able to create a cost model for the network in order to create the basic requirements for independent, critical cost analyzes, also with regard to the efficient use of state funds. But you will look in vain for the word regulation. “
So will people travel more by train in the future, or will logisticians increasingly switch from trucks to freight trains? After all, like the old government, the new coalition also wants to double the market share of rail in passenger transport and increase it to 25 percent in freight transport.
“Wishful thinking prevails,” criticizes Knorr. More money should flow into the rail network. But “the desired shift in traffic to rail is highly unlikely to occur to the desired extent”.
He has identified the Germany clock as the reason, with which passenger trains from the major stations in the country should leave every half hour. To do this, they need the right of way over goods traffic. This would “tend to exacerbate the structural disadvantages of rail in the transport of non-bulk goods”.
More traffic by rail remains a wish
Professor Alexander Eisenkopf, economist at the University of Friedrichshafen, also doubts that there will be a significant shift in traffic. It is true that massive investments should be made in rail and local transport, and small trucks over 3.5 tons will have to pay truck tolls in the future. All of this sounds “good and sensible, but one should not indulge in any illusions – by the time a clock in Germany attracts people and goods of relevant magnitudes onto the railroad, the climate-political battle should actually have been fought long ago.”
At the moment, the railway’s market share in passenger transport is just nine percent, and in freight transport it is 19 percent. “In view of the desperate condition of Deutsche Bahn, a fundamental structural reform would be more advisable than a free pass on climate policy.”
It is not in the federal interest if a federally owned company enters an already existing competitive market in order to sell electricity to private customers. Federal Audit Office
The traffic light coalition, however, is relying above all on the railways concentrating on the essentials: the transport of people and goods in the country. This means that the company will part with a large part of the more than 600 holdings.
The Federal Audit Office, among others, has been calling for this for a long time. In his latest report, the auditors once again criticized the conduct of the railway, whose subsidiary DB Energie also sells electricity to private customers.
“It is not in the federal interest if a federally owned company enters an already existing competitive market in order to sell electricity to private customers,” clarified the auditors and called on the federal government to exercise its influence as sole owner “and its interests vis-à-vis DB AG to represent”.
When the auditors of the Federal Audit Office scrutinize the work of the Federal Ministry of Transport, they rarely save with criticism. The latest comments on questions about Deutsche Bahn AG alone comprise 51 pages. Sometimes, from the auditor’s point of view, corporate and federal interests collide because both MPs and ministerial officials sit on the supervisory board.
Then they find out that the railway has not distributed profits from the infrastructure division to the federal government as agreed. Rather, she owes around 700 million euros, which the federal government should “examine and assert immediately”. In general, the auditors found a “laissez-faire attitude” on the part of the ministry.
“Intact infrastructure, punctual trains, a citizen-friendly offer for local transport and more climate protection are possible,” the examiners explain. “But all of this requires efficient structures and clear responsibilities.” Reforms should come about, without “taboos”.
SPD prevents more transparency and control at the railroad
One of the taboos, however, is the integrated group, i.e. a company that operates nationwide, regional and local train services under one roof, as well as the train stations, the energy supply and the rail network on which the competitors operate. There are more or less thick “Chinese walls”, and the train path prices are regulated by the Federal Network Agency.
Above all, the Greens and the FDP named clear goals in their election manifestos. The Greens wanted to make the group “more transparent and efficient” “and focus on the core business”, shifting “road and air traffic to rail”. The Liberals wanted to “separate the infrastructure and rail operations on the railways and privatize operations”, with the network “remaining in the property of the federal government”.
However, in line with the EVG railway workers’ union, the SPD rejected the separation of network and operation and prevailed. Deutsche Bahn AG is “a guarantor of reliable mobility. We will keep them as an integrated, publicly owned company, ”said the election manifesto. This is also what the coalition agreement says.
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