Berlin Federal Transport Minister Volker Wissing (FDP) wants to fundamentally modernize local public transport after the experience with the nine-euro ticket. “People voted on buying the ticket that it shouldn’t stay like this,” said the FDP politician on Deutschlandfunk on Wednesday.
At the same time, he promised that the federal government would participate in a new ticket. He had convinced Finance Minister and party friend Christian Lindner “that there must be another, modern ticket”. There should be “no relapse into the old tariff structures”. But first he wanted to talk about “content and structures”.
The federal government has provided 2.5 billion euros for the three-month discount campaign, which ends on Wednesday, to reimburse the transport companies for the loss of income. At the beginning of the month, a spokesman for Wissing had already confirmed to the Handelsblatt that the minister was prepared to contribute financially to a new ticket – if the coalition agreed and the federal states also made their contribution.
The federal government demands a concept from the federal states
As the ministry said, the ball is now back in the hands of the federal states. Last week, their transport ministers asked the federal government to submit a concept for a successor plan. Federal Minister of Finance Lindner explained on Wednesday that a nationwide valid digital ticket could be realized with a fraction of the financial resources of the nine-euro ticket. “Now it’s the turn of the countries. When the financing question is clear, the price can be set.”
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The federal states, however, are demanding more money from the federal government in view of the dramatically increased energy costs and the costs for personnel and materials. The Chairwoman of the Conference of Transport Ministers, Bremen Senator Maike Schaefer, appealed to the federal government to “fulfill its responsibility”.
The federal government should increase the annual regionalization funds, which the federal states use to finance local transport, from currently around ten billion euros for 2022 and 2023 by 1.65 billion euros each. In addition, they demand 1.5 billion euros more per year in order to transport twice as many people by 2030 as the federal government has set as a target.
Wissing, on the other hand, insists on reforms before there is more money. “We need a better tariff structure,” he demanded on Wednesday, as well as less bureaucracy and more digitization. Some transport companies are not yet able to sell their tickets online.
Rising ticket prices, falling supply
This was one of the reasons why Wissing, before the introduction of the nine-euro ticket, was unable to assert its claim that the ticket should only be sold digitally. In addition, this was also legally problematic, since it must always be possible to sell for cash. Wissing pointed out that ticket sales alone cost companies two billion euros a year.
The industry is already warning that tariffs could soon rise by up to 20 percent and there could be up to 30 percent fewer offers in individual regions. “The federal and state governments should stop shifting responsibility back and forth. We now need a decision quickly so that there are no cancellations and rising ticket prices, which make local transport unattractive for many people again,” warned Frank Zerban, Managing Director of the Federal Association of Local Rail Transport.
The CEO of Deutsche Bahn AG, Richard Lutz, also sees it this way: “Our infrastructure is currently reaching its limits on bottleneck routes and at congested junctions.” The railway has sold 26 million nine-euro tickets and had to on several routes Use extra trains and more staff. Lutz pointed out “with all the justified enthusiasm” for the discount campaign, “that inflation is making everything drastically more expensive and these negative effects on investments in rail have not yet been reflected in the federal budget”.
He only considers a successor solution to be sustainable under one condition: For every euro that flows into a successor ticket, the federal government should invest at least one euro in improving the offer and expanding the infrastructure.
However, this is not in sight, on the contrary. The federal budget 2023 provides less money than last. Accordingly, a distribution battle is already raging. According to the Federal Ministry of Transport, inland shipping alone, which was hit by the low water, has reported “an additional requirement of around 360 million euros”.
More: “Cleansing thunderstorm” – Habeck and Wissing argue about CO2 emissions in traffic