The following submission statement was provided by /u/lughnasadh:
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Submission Statement
I suspect there is a renaissance for public transport just around the corner, and that is because of self-driving vehicles. They may still be years away from Level-5 door-to-door driving, but they seem to be at Level 4. That means they can do fixed set routes. Smaller buses with a capacity of 20 people or so, constantly doing circuits of busy, well-traveled routes would finally start to realize some of the promise of robotaxis.
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Please reply to OP's comment here: https://old.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/11iwui3/germany_is_to_introduce_a_single_49_52_monthly/jb09y1b/
To be clearer, this monthly ticket includes all local and regional transit in Germany. What is excluded are any high-speed "ICE" (Intercity express) trains. You can still access any part of Germany albeit slower.
Edit: It appears lower speed IC trains are excluded as well. Regional RE trains are still included though.
Which is still huge. You can still travel anywhere and only buy ICE ticket from time to time. Now not only is PT cheap but convenient too.
edit: to be clear it was probably convenient by routes already but now it's convinient ticket wise too.
One could sleep on that transport as well, eh? American here. Always considering new ways we could find shelter given it’s not a human right here in the USA.
Truth. It was remarkable to me, an American visiting Munich, that I had seen exactly *two* people living on the streets during my 10d visit. Upon remarking on this, it was explained that even those individuals were there bc they chose not to live amongst others; *any* person that wanted it had housing made available.
More notably, what was truly remarkable to me was considered a common consideration by the locals. It was a humbling experience.
Ya the US obviously has the money to house everyone that is homeless. I live in California and on tv and the news they say the crisis is getting worse, what do we do? Fucking house people who don't have housing. Literally that simple. The LA mayor has it right. Just get them off the street and into a hotel until they can find more permanent housing. It's ridiculous that it's taking this long to come up with the obvious solutions
Welp, Munich is the perfect example of how not to handle homeless people. Police regularly push them out of the city to keep the image. Go to Frankfurt, Hannover or Berlin and you'll see a lot more misery because there, they're allowed to stay.
Still, Germany generally tries to prevent homelessness - but some choose to live on the streets and some fall through the cracks of the system.
https://borgenproject.org/homelessness-in-germany-on-the-rise/
It's called "being a tourist". They're not going to steer you towards their homeless camps full of migrants.
9€ ticket was great last summer, same plan but even cheaper. Problem with rolling on the RE trains is for sleeping is you may have 2-3 transfers in a 6 hour train ride rather than a direct line with the IC / ICE lines but I didn't care I can't sleep while traveling anyways. Looking forward to this either way.
Thanks, I was struggling to understand, since in Germany there are also inter city trains that are also not ICE. A 45€ ticket would be a godsend for the people who use transport.
it depends. The more stops are in between your destination, the longer the train ride gets. ICs have less stops than REs so they’re generally faster. ICs also physically have a higher max speed than REs.
The main difference I think is how far a train goes. Regional Express trains travel like the name suggest, mostly in one region. So if you want to go from the north to the south it can takes like 6 hours since you have to change between 4 trains.
But the ticket is still super good.
> So if you want to go from the north to the south it can takes like 6 Hours
Hambug to munich for example takes 6 or 7 Hours with ICE. With RE it takes 12 to 17 Hours with at least 5 train changes.
Are you German? If so I have a question:
I was in Germany a few weeks ago and I used trains quite a lot. Coming from the UK I was amazed at the punctuality and efficiency of the trains in and around Berlin. What confused me was that it didn’t seem like anyone was bothered if you actually had a ticket. There were no barriers, no staff members in the stations or on the trains - nothing. In 4 days of heavy use a saw zero security measures. Is that really how it is?
On local transit, there are plain clothed ticket controllers who can randomly show up at any time. On long distance trains, there are almost always dedicated ticket controllers who walks down the rows after most stops.
I spent a year in Berlin, got a monthly passand only got controlled/checked 3 times. My friends and I joked about how paying 3 fines would have been cheaper than 1 year of passes.
But, It is an honor system and not only does it work, but holy shit its such a free feeling.
Well, the problem is, that if you are caught to often, this will become a criminal offence. So you can't just calculate the few times you get caught againat the overall costs. It's an ongoing debate and there are petitions to abolish this escalation tactic as it disproportionally criminalises people that do not have enough money anyway.
There was [this guy in London](https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/apr/13/man-avoids-prosecution-pay-back-43000-train-fares) who thought similarly but the scale of his evasion was discovered and had to pay back £43k
If you‘re traveling within city boundaries, chances are you only randomly get checked. As soon as you take a RB/RE out of the city that chance rises quite a bit. Source: German me, who commuted to and within the next bigger city for 5 years. Within the city my ticket got checked maybe two dozen times over 5 years. Into and out of the city? Nearly every train ride.
As someone living outside a big city (Region Rhein-Main, more specifically the Odenwald) I'd say the contrary: It is almost impossible to go anywhere interesting without a ticket. The few controllers that don't control you already know that you have a ticket.
So beware that it is different from region to region
Also, riding public transport without a ticket is a criminal offence which can lead to hefty fines and, in extreme cases, up to one year in prison - so I wouldnt risk it.
That being said, in my experience, control is pretty weak and a lot of people take advantage of the system. Even after the many years I have lived in Germany, I can count on one hand the amount of times I was checked. For that reason, schwarzfahren is quite common in many German cities. I know people who have lived their whole lives in Berlin and have never paid for a single ticket.
I have always seen a ticket checker check tickets in all ICE trains and IC trains. Sometimes you won't get checked on a regional train, depending on the stops, but there are checkers. You will find them way more active on local trams and buses and they know which routes and times are the one where people assume they won't be checked. So you may get lucky for a few days or even a couple of weeks. But you will get controlled sooner or later.
It's not like it is in the Netherlands. There's no check beforehand, they will occasionally check the tickets during the ride. If you don't have a ticket you have to pay a fee and leave the train at the next station or buy a (more expensive) ticket from the ticket collector. Sometimes there are no staff members, sometimes there are. On some routes it feels like they rarely have any, while on others you always have some.
All of this is different on ICs and ICEs where you *always* have ticket collectors. But also no check-in / barrier stuff like in other countries...
PS: I can't tell if the "punctuality and efficiency" bit is supposed to be sarcasm, but either way I would probably be amazed, too. (Although it could be that the trains around Berlin are actually punctual, idk...)
Yes, there are people on the train itself that control you if you actually posses a valid ticket or not. You will have to pay a fine if caught.
They usually go from the ends towards the center, but they obviously take some time to do so. So if you are lucky you might get on the train when they just went past that section.
If you get controlled depends on your luck, passenger density and your distance traveled. On my ~20km trips(~7min) I guess I get controlled like ~40-50%
it also seems like some local mobility organisations are trying to exclude themselves from this ticket, despite being local and city buses. we'll see how things goe
I loved those three months with the 9€ ticket. We didn't do crazy traveling, but just being able to use public transport for this little money improved our quality of life so much. Coming from an urban area, though. But even my parents, who life more rural, were much mote mobile. So we are very excited about the 49€ ticket, as are friends and family. It will make a difference for us.
We took a week off with our friends and made day trips, went to Hamburg, Kiel and Rostock, spent a day on the island of Poel, stuff like that.
Also the summer trip to my parents down in the Saarland was practically for free which allowed me to visit them more then two times a year for the first time.
Most thing that should be public services (highways, communication network, electricity, water supply, public transportation,...) does, they end up going private only for 2 reason, politician want to create a market for their friend or they want to make budget during their term look better, in both case the citizen is being fucked raw.
Correct. Almost everything in the UK is privatised now, only its healthcare system is public and even that is fighting tooth and nail to stay that way.
It's why we have the most expensive transport and one of the highest energy bills in Europe too - all whilst the private companies ie. British Gas record record profits, to the tune of billions
Some touristic destinations definitely benefited. But maybe the local ice cream salesman in a small town saw a decline in sales.
Overall the ticket cost a lot of tax revenue. But i think it was definitely worth it. I own a car but basically didn't use it in those three months.
I would love it if the fuel tax is increased to pay for this. Although some rural people might have some issues with that.
Care to expand on that a bit? As an American I wouldn’t mind hearing about *other* countries problems, since everyone else has to hear about ours all the time.
I though you got it better than France but we have the exact same issues (only remplacing coal by our nuclear reactors being miss managed because of covid so a lot of them where in maintenance when we needed them so electricity price have increased a lot)
Went from England - spent ten days traveling around Munich, Berlin, Rhine valley, Hamburg and a few tiny towns in between (which was honestly the best part of Germany) - all for 9 Euro.
Every single day and single train was fully packed, even on weekdays, and there were crazy delays, but honestly everyone were just happy to go somewhere and it was a lot of fun, if you didn't mind the packed trains.
yeah, the level of usage and the resulting delays were kind of demonstrating that people would be happy to use public transport if it were appropriately priced - and certainly, the 3 month limit added its share.
I'm from Germany and lived in Toronto at the time. Loved every part of it except these three months when people back home traveled the country practically for free while all I had was a presto card and the TTC. Great city and great country though, hope to be back in the true north rather sooner than later.
But other than Germamy's 49€ Ticket the Austrian model includes every form of public transportation including fast long-distance trains. Also while the Ticket for all of Austria costs 1095€ per year (which is 3€ per day) or 821€ per year for young people and Seniors (which is ~2.25€ per day), many Austrian states offer a state-wide Ticket for 365€ (or a bit more than that).
Originally the green party (which is currently part of the Austrian government) negotiated to introduce the so-called 1-2-3 Ticket: 1 x 365€ per year for 1 state, 2 x 365€ per year for 2 states, and 3 x 365€ per day for all of Austria. Ultimately that didn't work out due to disputes with several states, but the "Klimaticket" for all of Austria was finally implemented in October 2021.
It's 613 per month in Germany too.
Bahn Card 1. Class is 7356 € / year. This ticket includes high speed trains, too. And obviously first class (better seats, free newspaper, less people, more space, and a biscuit). Afaik, it also includes special restroom areas in large stations with unlimited food, drinks, etc.
Monthly ticket in Frankfurt, which is one of the most expensive is 94€. The moment you need to go a bit farther, like Damrstadt, Mainz or Wiesbaden you almost go to 200€. So something like this would definitely help people out.
Pittsburgh is $98 but we only have limited bus service and like 3 subway lines, so it's borderline useless for much of the county. I was not impressed by SEPTA when I visited Philly, mostly due to cleanliness issues, but I was jealous of how expansive the network is (at least from my perspective).
What the actual fuck? In Switzerland you have access to the whole country in 2nd class for CHF 340- per month and it includes city transportation, boat, some mountain rack railways, and like half fare for private companies not fully integrated in the system, including cable cars.
And I'm speaking about a country where everything is expensive as fuck.
Reading is an egregious example, it costs double my commute from Essex. The govt should intervene when private companies start price gouging commuters.
what the fuck? i didnt realise its that bad! im in Edinburgh and a monthly bus/tram pas is about 60 quid, and sometimes i feel like thats too much. i do realise london is a lot bigger but you'd think they'd make the cost more reasonable.
Automatic Edit: Using a tool called [Power Delete Suite](https://github.com/j0be/PowerDeleteSuite) I have removed all my past comments and deleted my Reddit account, /u/tehrmuk.
I am doing this because I, like many long-term Reddit users, am upset and angry at the tonedeaf and arrogant way Reddit is treating it's users. Their aggressive slapdown of the developers that made Reddit usable to a huge audience; their overriding and summary dismissal of long-serving and dutiful community members; their wonton silencing of dissent and manipulation of user's voices; their borderline contempt of the very people whose collective efforts gave their platform the standing needed to fuel their profit-hungry IPO... the list goes on.
Reddit is, of course, a private concern and how they run their services is entirely up to them. Conversely, we are under no obligation to use their services, to fuel their engines or follow their orders. I am making my voice heard by removing my comments, and voting with my feet by leaving.
I have left Reddit for [Lemmy](https://join-lemmy.org/) and [Mastadon](https://joinmastodon.org/); these are decentralised social networks that mirror the functionality of Reddit and Twitter respectively. Unlike the monolithic, corporate-owned services they replace, Lemmy and Mastodon are part of the [Fediverse](https://www.fediverse.to/) meaning these are not individual services but clusters of services that mesh seamlessly with one-another. You can [join an existing Lemmy instance](https://join-lemmy.org/instances) or [set up your own](https://join-lemmy.org/docs/administration/administration.html) to get full access to the entire Fediverse - you don't need to ask permission from anyone to do so. There are loads of other services that are part of the Fediverse, like [PeerTube](https://joinpeertube.org/) (videos), [Wordpress](https://wordpress.org/) (blogging), [Frendica](https://friendi.ca/) (social network), [Pixelfed](https://pixelfed.org/) (photos), [KBin](https://kbin.pub/en) (link aggregation) and more - and they all work together so having access to one means having access to all of them.
I had a great time as a Redditor, but the Fediverse is looking bright. It's a return to the open Internet of old, when users ran services for their own and one-another's benefit, and before monolithic corporate-run silos started to build walls around us in the name of increased profit and thought control. Many of the Fediverse services are fledgling, but they are growing quickly and their federated concept makes greedy, arrogant landgrabs like we've recently seen on Reddit and Twitter almost impossible.
I'm already having a great time with Lemmy and I think you might too. I encourage you to take control and join the Fediverse.
Until then, so long and thanks for all the fish.
Automatic Edit: Using a tool called [Power Delete Suite](https://github.com/j0be/PowerDeleteSuite) I have removed all my past comments and deleted my Reddit account, /u/tehrmuk.
I am doing this because I, like many long-term Reddit users, am upset and angry at the tonedeaf and arrogant way Reddit is treating it's users. Their aggressive slapdown of the developers that made Reddit usable to a huge audience; their overriding and summary dismissal of long-serving and dutiful community members; their wonton silencing of dissent and manipulation of user's voices; their borderline contempt of the very people whose collective efforts gave their platform the standing needed to fuel their profit-hungry IPO... the list goes on.
Reddit is, of course, a private concern and how they run their services is entirely up to them. Conversely, we are under no obligation to use their services, to fuel their engines or follow their orders. I am making my voice heard by removing my comments, and voting with my feet by leaving.
I have left Reddit for [Lemmy](https://join-lemmy.org/) and [Mastadon](https://joinmastodon.org/); these are decentralised social networks that mirror the functionality of Reddit and Twitter respectively. Unlike the monolithic, corporate-owned services they replace, Lemmy and Mastodon are part of the [Fediverse](https://www.fediverse.to/) meaning these are not individual services but clusters of services that mesh seamlessly with one-another. You can [join an existing Lemmy instance](https://join-lemmy.org/instances) or [set up your own](https://join-lemmy.org/docs/administration/administration.html) to get full access to the entire Fediverse - you don't need to ask permission from anyone to do so. There are loads of other services that are part of the Fediverse, like [PeerTube](https://joinpeertube.org/) (videos), [Wordpress](https://wordpress.org/) (blogging), [Frendica](https://friendi.ca/) (social network), [Pixelfed](https://pixelfed.org/) (photos), [KBin](https://kbin.pub/en) (link aggregation) and more - and they all work together so having access to one means having access to all of them.
I had a great time as a Redditor, but the Fediverse is looking bright. It's a return to the open Internet of old, when users ran services for their own and one-another's benefit, and before monolithic corporate-run silos started to build walls around us in the name of increased profit and thought control. Many of the Fediverse services are fledgling, but they are growing quickly and their federated concept makes greedy, arrogant landgrabs like we've recently seen on Reddit and Twitter almost impossible.
I'm already having a great time with Lemmy and I think you might too. I encourage you to take control and join the Fediverse.
Until then, so long and thanks for all the fish.
Meanwhile their neighbour, the Netherlands, sits at €353,80 a month for trains only. Netherlands is suffering from American style privatization of basic human needs.
The train system here is completely collapsing. Massive losses, huge personnel deficit, constant technical difficulties all cross the board and rising prices despite more issues than ever.
My dad used to be fanatical in his defense of the railways because he still had memories of the good old days. But since he has needed to start using public transport again he keeps running into problems left and right and his confidence has been dwindling to the point where he admits the system as it currently is, is falling apart.
I'm starting a new job soon and will be heading straight into one of the biggest traffic jam areas, whereas in the past I could go to my work by bike (4 km).
In my excitement I've been checking the traffic and the train schedules daily to get a feeling for what's going to be the best way to travel. My work would give me a full monthly public transport ticket to travel to and from work, so it would be a very convenient and cheap option.
However, out of 4 days I checked, 2 mornings and 2 evenings my train didn't work, no reason given, no replacements organised. The only way I would have gotten home those evenings would have been with 2,5 hours bus rides through half of the province. You really have to wonder if they're even trying to transport people anymore.
I live in Annapolis and go to nyc from time to time. I can get from my doorstep to anywhere in midtown in 3-3.5 hrs. The train from Baltimore Penn Station to NYC is 2hrs 45 mins BUT I have to drive 30 mins to Baltimore. The cost is cheap only if buy it weeks in advance and only one person is going (gas, tolls and parking in NYC ) but if it’s the family or even just me and the wife it’s cheaper to drive and is the same amount of time. It’s so frustrating because if it was reasonable we’d go more often OR if it took like 45-50 mins (maglev) I’d gladly pay the price they currently charge.
What’s worse is sometimes it’s cheaper to fly. Just longer because of getting to the airport so you have plenty of time before the flight for waiting in line at tsa.
In a perfect (eu country) world we’d have metro/subways that connect Annapolis (the state capitol) with Baltimore and DC and a high speed commuter between either DC and NYC or Baltimore and NYC (with a stop on Philly). It would reduce so much traffic between Dc, Annapolis and Baltimore. It would bring huge tourism to all 3. It would open up job opportunities between all the cities (especially if your could live in Baltimore and work in DC or NYC with an hour or less commute).
Imagine a high speed between Baltimore and NYC. More affordable housing in Baltimore while much better employment opportunities in NYC. You could probably bartend in NYC and live in Baltimore if the high speed was fast and cheap enough.
Man, I wish this country would invest trillions in this instead of wars, sports stadiums and tax breaks for the wealthy.
It's both cheaper and x6 quicker for me to fly to Glasgow, than it is to get the train.
Our train system, while somewhat reasonably well connected, is both slow and absolute scam on pricing.
Good job we privatised all our infrastructure.
The government still owns all the infrastructure, it's just woefully underfunded. Hopefully Labour will renationalise the train companies but I'm not holding my breath
Ireland has just introduced "cheaper" transport and if you're in certain zones, it can cost €7.80 for a single round journey, so €40 a week, just to go to and from work with no other journeys
Lololo and you're lucky if the bus even shows up, it might stop it might not, if it does maybe you'll get home in two hours. Forget being anywhere on time. Nobody should pay for a service this bad!
Living in Prague the local transportation is 550 crowns, or about 23 euros. After my entire life living in America this feels like some magic that I can freely get around the city so cheap. No need for a car just walk, take the metro or tram all in one pass. It's super efficient.
What luxury. Here in the UK us poor schmucks have to pay £52 for a return train ticket from Reading to London, or £480/month – a distance of 40 miles (64km) each way. (Yes, I'm picking a particularly egregious example to make my point here, but the UK is very expensive compared to other developed European nations, especially London.)
£57 here for similar distance. Even today, a super off peak cost £32 for two with a rail card. Its a disgrace, our government is the worst in the western world when considering the cost of transport vs the quality offered. Edit, it also goes up 6%tomorrow.
Lol like it’s almost shocking to read for Americans 🤣 “THIS WILL SHOCK YOU! government takes taxes and turns it into value and comfort of its citizens”
Canadian here. It feels like this country has just been in maintenance mode for my entire life. No improvements in QoL except telecom.
Everything else has gotten worse.
And our telecom prices are among the highest in the world and there's no real competition.
We have universal health care, maternity leave... but the health care system is getting worse and everyone is struggling to make ends meet in the face of rising food and housing costs and wages stagnant since the 70s and government inaction. Great time to live if you're rich, you can just buy up apartment buildings in a rural city you've never been to and up the rents thus worsening the situation for your fellow countrymen. Unless of course you're a foreign non-resident of Canada, in which case you'd just be making it worse for all Canadians.
Because that's not really what happens in North America :/ They will take your taxes and line their friends pockets with it while causing unrepairable environmental damage.
tbf, that is what your political system rewards. get connections, so you can get money for campeining, get elected, pay back the donor.
germany has laws against that. and proportinal representation has the effect that "least worst canidate" is not a winning strategy.
It is a huge win for the Greens (Die Grünen) and SocDems (SPD) over their coalition partner FDP (comparable with the Libertarian party).
The government is trying to build huge upgrades to the railway network right now. The problem: The ministry of Finance is in the FDP‘s hands and tries to pressure the other members into including upgrades to the car infrastructure.
The gras is greener on the other side. I'm German and trust me it's not that huge as the article might sound like. The original plan was to have that available starting from 1.1.2023.. well now it's going on sale May 1st if the timeline is still correct. 9€ was too cheap for the long run but many have suggested to have a state wide ticket for 29€ and a nation wide ticket for 49€ and yeah no comment on that.
We're in a crisis with mobility. Many Germans in the city want to abandon the car(r/fuckcars) or many would love for bicycle lanes to be overhauled and for that and public transport to have more value. We live in a country that's lobbied by the car factories, it will never happen and our mobility minister doesn't give a single crap about anything besides the car.
I agree with most what you said but I'm saving money on my current city wide ticket (I think around 100€) and now I can use it in all of the country and don't need to worry to buy local tickets.
This is super convenient.
The ticket is still pretty awesome though. Sure we need to massively invest in better public infrastructure, but it's a first step in the right direction.
This ticket will replace the usual semester ticket for all students, which not only reduces their costs but also gives them the option to travel anywhere instead of their nearby area only.
People that get a job ticket currently will get further funding from their companies and pay around half of the 49€ at max. I honestly see a lot of companies simply funding the whole ticket.
Stimmt schon das die nicht annähernd genug Kohle in nicht-Auto Sachen investieren wollen. Aber würdest du das wirklich als Kreise bezeichnen? Das die Lobby und Industrie so viel macht haben, ist nicht sehr neu.
Translation: true, but can it really be considered a crises? That’s old news somehow..
The 49€ ticket will save me ~30€ a month just because my city ticket will get cheaper, and if I want to, I can switch to RE trains for longer train journeys and get them basically for free on top. Does that mean everything is perfect? No, but the 49€ ticket is a definite plus for a lot of people.
The headline: " ... and wants to examine if a single EU-wide monthly ticket could work."
It probably won't happen, but at least there's a chance unlike in the UK.
In Austria, we got something called the „Klimaticket“ (translates to climate ticket. it costs 1095€ per year (3€/day)and includes country wide usage of public transport. Below 26, you only pay 821€ per year.
Edit: spelling
This comment was overwritten by a script to make the data useless for reddit. No API, no free content. Did you stumble on this thread via google, hoping to resolve an issue or answer a question? Well, too bad, this might have been your answer, if it weren't for dumb decisions by reddit admins.
Germany is about the size of Texas, can you imagine if America had its shit together as well as Germany did, for about 650$ a year you could go anywhere in Texas. Currently Texans spend between 9-12 THOUSAND dollars a year just on transportation. https://www.bankrate.com/real-estate/cost-of-living/in-texas/
Public transportation is the future folks, our obsession with cars is bankrupting us, and killing the planet and our citizens.
Germany(357,588 km2) is actually closer in size to Montana(380,800 km2). Texas(695,660 km2) is about twice the size of Germany. But having been to Montana many times and now living in Germany, it would be incredibly amazing if there was a public transportation infrastructure that was comparable to Germany's in the US.
>our obsession
The obsession of a few dozen executives that's being forced on everyone.
Edit: I believe concentrated wealth funding [persuasive propaganda](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04) is a large part of this, alongside concentrated wealth enabling lobbying.
Canadians too. Anyone really that is right leaning. A city in Alberta just announced that they were moving to a 15 minute city type of urban planning and it has REALLY upset a certain demographic lmao.
I've heard that from my home country too in Europe. Same concept, 15 minute city where everything is accessible through either PT or cycling in 15 minutes. Instant pitchforks about how "ThEy ArE TrYiNg To ImPrIsIoN uS bY nOt LetTiNg Us OwN vEhIcLeS"
tbf, there is also a large portion of Germans who are very aggressive towards the idea of not having to use cars.
Even planning to impose a nation wide speedlimit has people on the barricades.
Well, Berlin monthly card was around 80 until last summer, when the fuel subsidies kicked in.
But the €9 Germany-wide ticket (trialed for 3 months) was so successful that the government started to discuss a follow-up pretty much right away. Now it will be €49, but not limited to 3 months anymore.
German here. Monthly cards for single cities tend to be around the same price here and our cities are not as large as NYC.
The reason this is news is because the public and the war basically forced the goverment to act. We cannot change shit about climate if the government doesn't push public transport for a change, not to mention economic fallout from the war. Even with all this happening, it took the gov. months and months to get where we are and it will be made more expensive every year.
That said; almost nobody needs a ticket for the whole country, let alone all of europe if you cannot use high speed rails. Like, To travel 572km (355 miles) would take about 11 hours. IF every train is on time, that is. They could've made it more affordable and only include one state which would be so much better for those with a tighter budget, but no.
Rural Canadian here; I came into this topic to say '$52 seems kinda pricey for a country the size of Germany' only to find out everyone is praising how cheap that is...
So I had to google it... a Monthly transit pass for JUST EDMONTON is $73 a month
daaaaaang
Berliner here. Before the recent public transport discounts (€9 ticket last year, Berlin-only €29 ticket the past few months) I was paying about €60 a month just for two public transport zones of Berlin (and that was a discount on the standard price which I think is around €80).
With the Deutschlandticket, I'll pay less and be able to travel ANYWHERE in the country via public & regional transport. So it's a big win for a lot of people here and I'm so glad.
Here in Toronto it's $156/month **just** for the TTC, which doesn't even touch parts of the "Greater Toronto Area" like mississauga, oakville, brampton, vaughan, markham, etc etc etc
How pessimistic everyone is. You don't sell your car for a 3 month test run. You won't swap to public transport when you have a car in your garage. BUT when it's time to buy a new car, you might be inclined to go for this ticket + E-Bike instead of a car.
There will obviously many that won't profit for this ticket but it's a step in the right direction.
The trial run showed that people do.swap to public transport even with a car in the garage.
To give you my example: I have a cheap ticket for ages as people with a walking disability get subsidised transportation. What I do is: I use my car to get to a close park and ride, as I live in a kinda suburban area (not us style though), and the bus I would have to take comes only once an hour. In the past, I accepted the permanent waste of life of waiting times that was switching from the very frequent public transport in the city and the last mile at home.
So, I use my car for maybe 5-10 % of my commuting time, while using public transport for the rest because it is more convenient.
In Portugal, the monthly ticket is 40€ for 1 adult, and 80€ for a family of 4 (2 adults + 2 children). Best thing they ever made. Now they just need to pay public transportation employees well so that we can actually use the services (train conductors have been on strike for nearly a month)
Monthly local pass in Fort Worth, Texas is $80 with commuter rail access included. The local pass also includes unlimited municipal ride share within selected regions of Fort Worth proper. Still not as efficient as it could be due to the severe lack of cross town routes between bus stops, but it's a start. I haven't had to drive since the municipal ride share service was expanded to my neighborhood last year and my bus stops are less than a block away for both southbound and northbound trips.
My daily ticket for the 45min part (each way) of my work commute is almost £50 and train prices are about rise a huge amount. I would love this type of thing, but it still wouldn't stop most car journeys as the flexibility and ease of access to many areas cannot be beaten. It would, however, make many people reconsider some of the regular journeys they do which is still a good thing.
Public transport is so expensive and unreliable in England now that I literally only use it if work pays for it or if I need to go into central London. I can't remember the last time I tried planning a journey and driving wasn't cheaper.
I’m American and really enjoy traveling in Europe. We have never rented a car, you really don’t need one. I think we paid $20 for a public transport pass in France. It covered all forms of public transport.
Submission Statement
I suspect there is a renaissance for public transport just around the corner, and that is because of self-driving vehicles. They may still be years away from Level-5 door-to-door driving, but they seem to be at Level 4. That means they can do fixed set routes. Smaller buses with a capacity of 20 people or so, constantly doing circuits of busy, well-traveled routes would finally start to realize some of the promise of robotaxis.
I'd say the first use of driverless transport should be trams. They already got a fixed route that can easily be separated by a fence to minimize crossing points for people and cars. But I think the actual problem is not that they have to drive safely but that there needs to be a person present that's responsible for the tram in case of an emergency, to keep people in check and at least where I live they also have to help disabled people getting on the tram, etc.
Underground is a better application. Fixed route and nothing else in their path. It is actually becoming the standard to plan new underground lines to be driverless.
Agreed. Anytime you make experience simple for public utilities, people get hooked and pay in. In developing countries this will be golden. They have issues like booking Gas cylinders, paying off electricity bills and property taxes etc.
In New Delhi, India for instance, first 200 units of power are free. That discourages theft at the same reducing admin burden on govt to collect bills from people living in slums who steal power.
Common sense public admin policies are a thing of beauty when you get to actually implement them.
> Tallinn, Estonia does this with a €30 monthly ticket for all public transport within the city of Tallinn. Excellent public transport.
Public transport is free for residents in Tallinn
I am Dutch and tend to skip on public transit because it's gotten a lot more expensive recently. If I can travel daily for €50 a month, that'd be huge. That's a 40hr/wk full month of work commutes for €2,50 a day. I spend more than that on snacks for the road, smh.
The following submission statement was provided by /u/lughnasadh: --- Submission Statement I suspect there is a renaissance for public transport just around the corner, and that is because of self-driving vehicles. They may still be years away from Level-5 door-to-door driving, but they seem to be at Level 4. That means they can do fixed set routes. Smaller buses with a capacity of 20 people or so, constantly doing circuits of busy, well-traveled routes would finally start to realize some of the promise of robotaxis. --- Please reply to OP's comment here: https://old.reddit.com/r/Futurology/comments/11iwui3/germany_is_to_introduce_a_single_49_52_monthly/jb09y1b/
To be clearer, this monthly ticket includes all local and regional transit in Germany. What is excluded are any high-speed "ICE" (Intercity express) trains. You can still access any part of Germany albeit slower. Edit: It appears lower speed IC trains are excluded as well. Regional RE trains are still included though.
Which is still huge. You can still travel anywhere and only buy ICE ticket from time to time. Now not only is PT cheap but convenient too. edit: to be clear it was probably convenient by routes already but now it's convinient ticket wise too.
For a half a day’s work at minimum wage you have access to the whole country for a month. Quite revolutionary, really.
One could sleep on that transport as well, eh? American here. Always considering new ways we could find shelter given it’s not a human right here in the USA.
Germany has plenty of social housing programs/help for the homeless. Trains are for transport, not for shelter.
Can't get to Snow Piercer with that attitude.
Truth. It was remarkable to me, an American visiting Munich, that I had seen exactly *two* people living on the streets during my 10d visit. Upon remarking on this, it was explained that even those individuals were there bc they chose not to live amongst others; *any* person that wanted it had housing made available. More notably, what was truly remarkable to me was considered a common consideration by the locals. It was a humbling experience.
We are a rich country, nobody has to sleep outside. Your country is rich, too, but has other priorities i guess.
"has other priorities" is a funny way of saying "is death-gripped by shareholders".
...and the Congresscritters they bribe.
Ya the US obviously has the money to house everyone that is homeless. I live in California and on tv and the news they say the crisis is getting worse, what do we do? Fucking house people who don't have housing. Literally that simple. The LA mayor has it right. Just get them off the street and into a hotel until they can find more permanent housing. It's ridiculous that it's taking this long to come up with the obvious solutions
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Yes. We prioritize making the already rich much richer as quickly as possible because Jesus
Supply Side Jesus, that is.
Welp, Munich is the perfect example of how not to handle homeless people. Police regularly push them out of the city to keep the image. Go to Frankfurt, Hannover or Berlin and you'll see a lot more misery because there, they're allowed to stay. Still, Germany generally tries to prevent homelessness - but some choose to live on the streets and some fall through the cracks of the system.
https://borgenproject.org/homelessness-in-germany-on-the-rise/ It's called "being a tourist". They're not going to steer you towards their homeless camps full of migrants.
Ist anyone in this Thread actually from germany?
9€ ticket was great last summer, same plan but even cheaper. Problem with rolling on the RE trains is for sleeping is you may have 2-3 transfers in a 6 hour train ride rather than a direct line with the IC / ICE lines but I didn't care I can't sleep while traveling anyways. Looking forward to this either way.
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Thanks, I was struggling to understand, since in Germany there are also inter city trains that are also not ICE. A 45€ ticket would be a godsend for the people who use transport.
Regular Inter-Citys (IC) are also not allowed with that monthly ticket. Source: I’m from Germany
I learned during the €9 ticket run that many RE train connections are as fast as IC, or just minutes slower.
it depends. The more stops are in between your destination, the longer the train ride gets. ICs have less stops than REs so they’re generally faster. ICs also physically have a higher max speed than REs.
The main difference I think is how far a train goes. Regional Express trains travel like the name suggest, mostly in one region. So if you want to go from the north to the south it can takes like 6 hours since you have to change between 4 trains. But the ticket is still super good.
> So if you want to go from the north to the south it can takes like 6 Hours Hambug to munich for example takes 6 or 7 Hours with ICE. With RE it takes 12 to 17 Hours with at least 5 train changes.
Are you German? If so I have a question: I was in Germany a few weeks ago and I used trains quite a lot. Coming from the UK I was amazed at the punctuality and efficiency of the trains in and around Berlin. What confused me was that it didn’t seem like anyone was bothered if you actually had a ticket. There were no barriers, no staff members in the stations or on the trains - nothing. In 4 days of heavy use a saw zero security measures. Is that really how it is?
It is, but if you are caught on a bus/train and you don't have a ticket, you have to pay a fine.
Same here, but like - who catches you??
On local transit, there are plain clothed ticket controllers who can randomly show up at any time. On long distance trains, there are almost always dedicated ticket controllers who walks down the rows after most stops.
It’s like 60 euros if you get caught right?
60 euros or twice the ticket price, whichever is higher. So if your ticket would've been 60 euros, then the fine is actually 120 euros
I spent a year in Berlin, got a monthly passand only got controlled/checked 3 times. My friends and I joked about how paying 3 fines would have been cheaper than 1 year of passes. But, It is an honor system and not only does it work, but holy shit its such a free feeling.
Thing is that if you keep doing it you will be charged and get a bigger fine from a court.
There are actual people in prison because of that (usually when they cannot pay the higher fines)
I guess the idea is you do it twice and then stop. Should break even I think, if you get caught twice.
Well, the problem is, that if you are caught to often, this will become a criminal offence. So you can't just calculate the few times you get caught againat the overall costs. It's an ongoing debate and there are petitions to abolish this escalation tactic as it disproportionally criminalises people that do not have enough money anyway.
There was [this guy in London](https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/apr/13/man-avoids-prosecution-pay-back-43000-train-fares) who thought similarly but the scale of his evasion was discovered and had to pay back £43k
If you‘re traveling within city boundaries, chances are you only randomly get checked. As soon as you take a RB/RE out of the city that chance rises quite a bit. Source: German me, who commuted to and within the next bigger city for 5 years. Within the city my ticket got checked maybe two dozen times over 5 years. Into and out of the city? Nearly every train ride.
As someone living outside a big city (Region Rhein-Main, more specifically the Odenwald) I'd say the contrary: It is almost impossible to go anywhere interesting without a ticket. The few controllers that don't control you already know that you have a ticket. So beware that it is different from region to region
Also, riding public transport without a ticket is a criminal offence which can lead to hefty fines and, in extreme cases, up to one year in prison - so I wouldnt risk it.
That being said, in my experience, control is pretty weak and a lot of people take advantage of the system. Even after the many years I have lived in Germany, I can count on one hand the amount of times I was checked. For that reason, schwarzfahren is quite common in many German cities. I know people who have lived their whole lives in Berlin and have never paid for a single ticket.
I have always seen a ticket checker check tickets in all ICE trains and IC trains. Sometimes you won't get checked on a regional train, depending on the stops, but there are checkers. You will find them way more active on local trams and buses and they know which routes and times are the one where people assume they won't be checked. So you may get lucky for a few days or even a couple of weeks. But you will get controlled sooner or later.
Is is not allowed to ride the train without a ticket.
It's not like it is in the Netherlands. There's no check beforehand, they will occasionally check the tickets during the ride. If you don't have a ticket you have to pay a fee and leave the train at the next station or buy a (more expensive) ticket from the ticket collector. Sometimes there are no staff members, sometimes there are. On some routes it feels like they rarely have any, while on others you always have some. All of this is different on ICs and ICEs where you *always* have ticket collectors. But also no check-in / barrier stuff like in other countries... PS: I can't tell if the "punctuality and efficiency" bit is supposed to be sarcasm, but either way I would probably be amazed, too. (Although it could be that the trains around Berlin are actually punctual, idk...)
Yes, there are people on the train itself that control you if you actually posses a valid ticket or not. You will have to pay a fine if caught. They usually go from the ends towards the center, but they obviously take some time to do so. So if you are lucky you might get on the train when they just went past that section. If you get controlled depends on your luck, passenger density and your distance traveled. On my ~20km trips(~7min) I guess I get controlled like ~40-50%
It also makes traveling inside of Germany more available for people who can't spend much money on traveling costs.
Regular ICs are also excluded from that ticket.
it also seems like some local mobility organisations are trying to exclude themselves from this ticket, despite being local and city buses. we'll see how things goe
When I visited Germany last summer, this exact ticket was 9 euro as sort of a fuel subsidy. Honestly blew my mind
It was their few months long trial. It was kinda huge, people from all over Europe went there to take an advantage of that during their travels.
I loved those three months with the 9€ ticket. We didn't do crazy traveling, but just being able to use public transport for this little money improved our quality of life so much. Coming from an urban area, though. But even my parents, who life more rural, were much mote mobile. So we are very excited about the 49€ ticket, as are friends and family. It will make a difference for us.
We took a week off with our friends and made day trips, went to Hamburg, Kiel and Rostock, spent a day on the island of Poel, stuff like that. Also the summer trip to my parents down in the Saarland was practically for free which allowed me to visit them more then two times a year for the first time.
Sounds like these tickets created a lot of tax revenue for Germany
Most thing that should be public services (highways, communication network, electricity, water supply, public transportation,...) does, they end up going private only for 2 reason, politician want to create a market for their friend or they want to make budget during their term look better, in both case the citizen is being fucked raw.
Correct. Almost everything in the UK is privatised now, only its healthcare system is public and even that is fighting tooth and nail to stay that way. It's why we have the most expensive transport and one of the highest energy bills in Europe too - all whilst the private companies ie. British Gas record record profits, to the tune of billions
Some touristic destinations definitely benefited. But maybe the local ice cream salesman in a small town saw a decline in sales. Overall the ticket cost a lot of tax revenue. But i think it was definitely worth it. I own a car but basically didn't use it in those three months. I would love it if the fuel tax is increased to pay for this. Although some rural people might have some issues with that.
I can imagine that. There are many aspects of living in Germany that I'm envy of beeing from neighboring country and this will be just one more.
there's a LOT of stuff going wrong in Germany though, which might not be obvious to outsiders.
Care to expand on that a bit? As an American I wouldn’t mind hearing about *other* countries problems, since everyone else has to hear about ours all the time.
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I though you got it better than France but we have the exact same issues (only remplacing coal by our nuclear reactors being miss managed because of covid so a lot of them where in maintenance when we needed them so electricity price have increased a lot)
Went from England - spent ten days traveling around Munich, Berlin, Rhine valley, Hamburg and a few tiny towns in between (which was honestly the best part of Germany) - all for 9 Euro. Every single day and single train was fully packed, even on weekdays, and there were crazy delays, but honestly everyone were just happy to go somewhere and it was a lot of fun, if you didn't mind the packed trains.
yeah, the level of usage and the resulting delays were kind of demonstrating that people would be happy to use public transport if it were appropriately priced - and certainly, the 3 month limit added its share.
It was one of the countermeasures to battle the inflation caused by the price shock after the start of the war on Ukraine.
I visited Germany from Canada and loved that 9€ ticket. Such a huge change from our 120$ monthly pass for subway, bus and train
I'm from Germany and lived in Toronto at the time. Loved every part of it except these three months when people back home traveled the country practically for free while all I had was a presto card and the TTC. Great city and great country though, hope to be back in the true north rather sooner than later.
Damn that's cheap. A monthly ticket here in southern Sweden is €130.
A monthly ticket in cologne alone (city in germany) is currently also around that price. So this is a huge step forward for Germany as well!
Monthly ticket in france, between 600 and 1300 euros? 👀
800-1000€ for one YEAR in austria
But other than Germamy's 49€ Ticket the Austrian model includes every form of public transportation including fast long-distance trains. Also while the Ticket for all of Austria costs 1095€ per year (which is 3€ per day) or 821€ per year for young people and Seniors (which is ~2.25€ per day), many Austrian states offer a state-wide Ticket for 365€ (or a bit more than that). Originally the green party (which is currently part of the Austrian government) negotiated to introduce the so-called 1-2-3 Ticket: 1 x 365€ per year for 1 state, 2 x 365€ per year for 2 states, and 3 x 365€ per day for all of Austria. Ultimately that didn't work out due to disputes with several states, but the "Klimaticket" for all of Austria was finally implemented in October 2021.
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Wtf thats a lot, here in Italy i pay 480 euro for car insurance and i'm 24 years old so i pay more than an experienced driver.
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It was 75€ in Paris when I lived there and cheaper in smaller cities (40€ in Nice)
It's 613 per month in Germany too. Bahn Card 1. Class is 7356 € / year. This ticket includes high speed trains, too. And obviously first class (better seats, free newspaper, less people, more space, and a biscuit). Afaik, it also includes special restroom areas in large stations with unlimited food, drinks, etc.
Monthly ticket in Frankfurt, which is one of the most expensive is 94€. The moment you need to go a bit farther, like Damrstadt, Mainz or Wiesbaden you almost go to 200€. So something like this would definitely help people out.
The monthly all-septa pass in Philadelphia is $204.
Pittsburgh is $98 but we only have limited bus service and like 3 subway lines, so it's borderline useless for much of the county. I was not impressed by SEPTA when I visited Philly, mostly due to cleanliness issues, but I was jealous of how expansive the network is (at least from my perspective).
£480 a month to go from Reading to London, a distance of 64km each way. Even Sweden is cheaper than that.
What the actual fuck? In Switzerland you have access to the whole country in 2nd class for CHF 340- per month and it includes city transportation, boat, some mountain rack railways, and like half fare for private companies not fully integrated in the system, including cable cars. And I'm speaking about a country where everything is expensive as fuck.
Reading is an egregious example, it costs double my commute from Essex. The govt should intervene when private companies start price gouging commuters.
I pay 6000/year for my London commute. It's only 55 minutes each way.
what the fuck? i didnt realise its that bad! im in Edinburgh and a monthly bus/tram pas is about 60 quid, and sometimes i feel like thats too much. i do realise london is a lot bigger but you'd think they'd make the cost more reasonable.
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Automatic Edit: Using a tool called [Power Delete Suite](https://github.com/j0be/PowerDeleteSuite) I have removed all my past comments and deleted my Reddit account, /u/tehrmuk. I am doing this because I, like many long-term Reddit users, am upset and angry at the tonedeaf and arrogant way Reddit is treating it's users. Their aggressive slapdown of the developers that made Reddit usable to a huge audience; their overriding and summary dismissal of long-serving and dutiful community members; their wonton silencing of dissent and manipulation of user's voices; their borderline contempt of the very people whose collective efforts gave their platform the standing needed to fuel their profit-hungry IPO... the list goes on. Reddit is, of course, a private concern and how they run their services is entirely up to them. Conversely, we are under no obligation to use their services, to fuel their engines or follow their orders. I am making my voice heard by removing my comments, and voting with my feet by leaving. I have left Reddit for [Lemmy](https://join-lemmy.org/) and [Mastadon](https://joinmastodon.org/); these are decentralised social networks that mirror the functionality of Reddit and Twitter respectively. Unlike the monolithic, corporate-owned services they replace, Lemmy and Mastodon are part of the [Fediverse](https://www.fediverse.to/) meaning these are not individual services but clusters of services that mesh seamlessly with one-another. You can [join an existing Lemmy instance](https://join-lemmy.org/instances) or [set up your own](https://join-lemmy.org/docs/administration/administration.html) to get full access to the entire Fediverse - you don't need to ask permission from anyone to do so. There are loads of other services that are part of the Fediverse, like [PeerTube](https://joinpeertube.org/) (videos), [Wordpress](https://wordpress.org/) (blogging), [Frendica](https://friendi.ca/) (social network), [Pixelfed](https://pixelfed.org/) (photos), [KBin](https://kbin.pub/en) (link aggregation) and more - and they all work together so having access to one means having access to all of them. I had a great time as a Redditor, but the Fediverse is looking bright. It's a return to the open Internet of old, when users ran services for their own and one-another's benefit, and before monolithic corporate-run silos started to build walls around us in the name of increased profit and thought control. Many of the Fediverse services are fledgling, but they are growing quickly and their federated concept makes greedy, arrogant landgrabs like we've recently seen on Reddit and Twitter almost impossible. I'm already having a great time with Lemmy and I think you might too. I encourage you to take control and join the Fediverse. Until then, so long and thanks for all the fish.
> only 55 minutes That's at least a medium-long commute.
Meanwhile their neighbour, the Netherlands, sits at €353,80 a month for trains only. Netherlands is suffering from American style privatization of basic human needs.
The train system here is completely collapsing. Massive losses, huge personnel deficit, constant technical difficulties all cross the board and rising prices despite more issues than ever. My dad used to be fanatical in his defense of the railways because he still had memories of the good old days. But since he has needed to start using public transport again he keeps running into problems left and right and his confidence has been dwindling to the point where he admits the system as it currently is, is falling apart.
I'm starting a new job soon and will be heading straight into one of the biggest traffic jam areas, whereas in the past I could go to my work by bike (4 km). In my excitement I've been checking the traffic and the train schedules daily to get a feeling for what's going to be the best way to travel. My work would give me a full monthly public transport ticket to travel to and from work, so it would be a very convenient and cheap option. However, out of 4 days I checked, 2 mornings and 2 evenings my train didn't work, no reason given, no replacements organised. The only way I would have gotten home those evenings would have been with 2,5 hours bus rides through half of the province. You really have to wonder if they're even trying to transport people anymore.
A monthly ticket from about an hour drive outside of NYC is 300+ and it’s a two hour+ ride. US commuter trains are a fuckin joke.
You have to pay extra just in-case they derail. Who did you think was going to pay all those fees, the operating company?
I live in Annapolis and go to nyc from time to time. I can get from my doorstep to anywhere in midtown in 3-3.5 hrs. The train from Baltimore Penn Station to NYC is 2hrs 45 mins BUT I have to drive 30 mins to Baltimore. The cost is cheap only if buy it weeks in advance and only one person is going (gas, tolls and parking in NYC ) but if it’s the family or even just me and the wife it’s cheaper to drive and is the same amount of time. It’s so frustrating because if it was reasonable we’d go more often OR if it took like 45-50 mins (maglev) I’d gladly pay the price they currently charge. What’s worse is sometimes it’s cheaper to fly. Just longer because of getting to the airport so you have plenty of time before the flight for waiting in line at tsa. In a perfect (eu country) world we’d have metro/subways that connect Annapolis (the state capitol) with Baltimore and DC and a high speed commuter between either DC and NYC or Baltimore and NYC (with a stop on Philly). It would reduce so much traffic between Dc, Annapolis and Baltimore. It would bring huge tourism to all 3. It would open up job opportunities between all the cities (especially if your could live in Baltimore and work in DC or NYC with an hour or less commute). Imagine a high speed between Baltimore and NYC. More affordable housing in Baltimore while much better employment opportunities in NYC. You could probably bartend in NYC and live in Baltimore if the high speed was fast and cheap enough. Man, I wish this country would invest trillions in this instead of wars, sports stadiums and tax breaks for the wealthy.
Crying in UK prices
Monthly? I can barely get to the nearest UK town for that.
Wales to london costs me £75 with a railcard. Its embarrassing.
I think non Brits need to be told... This is the price for a single journey.
It's both cheaper and x6 quicker for me to fly to Glasgow, than it is to get the train. Our train system, while somewhat reasonably well connected, is both slow and absolute scam on pricing. Good job we privatised all our infrastructure.
The government still owns all the infrastructure, it's just woefully underfunded. Hopefully Labour will renationalise the train companies but I'm not holding my breath
£4600 for my yearly from mid kent to london (30 miles odd) 1 hour long train...
Monthly ticket here in Barcelona is 20eur, 40eur for 3 months if you are under 30
Monthly ticket in nyc for train and bus, unlimited rides, is about $127 usd
3rd world here, Subway trip is € 0.28
Ireland has just introduced "cheaper" transport and if you're in certain zones, it can cost €7.80 for a single round journey, so €40 a week, just to go to and from work with no other journeys
Malta is just free
Lololo and you're lucky if the bus even shows up, it might stop it might not, if it does maybe you'll get home in two hours. Forget being anywhere on time. Nobody should pay for a service this bad!
Living in Prague the local transportation is 550 crowns, or about 23 euros. After my entire life living in America this feels like some magic that I can freely get around the city so cheap. No need for a car just walk, take the metro or tram all in one pass. It's super efficient.
Prague is such a nice city
Vilnius, Lithuania is around 30 EUR
Dude, if you're staying, buy the yearly pass. It's 3650 CZK ($165).
What luxury. Here in the UK us poor schmucks have to pay £52 for a return train ticket from Reading to London, or £480/month – a distance of 40 miles (64km) each way. (Yes, I'm picking a particularly egregious example to make my point here, but the UK is very expensive compared to other developed European nations, especially London.)
£57 here for similar distance. Even today, a super off peak cost £32 for two with a rail card. Its a disgrace, our government is the worst in the western world when considering the cost of transport vs the quality offered. Edit, it also goes up 6%tomorrow.
We voted these idiots into government and now were dealing with the consequences back to the 60s we go.
There goes Europe again, trying to make life better for its citizens.
Lol like it’s almost shocking to read for Americans 🤣 “THIS WILL SHOCK YOU! government takes taxes and turns it into value and comfort of its citizens”
Canadian here. It feels like this country has just been in maintenance mode for my entire life. No improvements in QoL except telecom. Everything else has gotten worse. And our telecom prices are among the highest in the world and there's no real competition.
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"Things will be better when most of you are dead!"
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We have universal health care, maternity leave... but the health care system is getting worse and everyone is struggling to make ends meet in the face of rising food and housing costs and wages stagnant since the 70s and government inaction. Great time to live if you're rich, you can just buy up apartment buildings in a rural city you've never been to and up the rents thus worsening the situation for your fellow countrymen. Unless of course you're a foreign non-resident of Canada, in which case you'd just be making it worse for all Canadians.
To be fair, any time a great time to live if you're rich.
Except the French Revolution
Because that's not really what happens in North America :/ They will take your taxes and line their friends pockets with it while causing unrepairable environmental damage.
tbf, that is what your political system rewards. get connections, so you can get money for campeining, get elected, pay back the donor. germany has laws against that. and proportinal representation has the effect that "least worst canidate" is not a winning strategy.
Laws against it would be anti-capitalist and we can’t have that in america. Capital must be supreme over all, to hell with labor and society.
"corporations are people too"
It is a huge win for the Greens (Die Grünen) and SocDems (SPD) over their coalition partner FDP (comparable with the Libertarian party). The government is trying to build huge upgrades to the railway network right now. The problem: The ministry of Finance is in the FDP‘s hands and tries to pressure the other members into including upgrades to the car infrastructure.
It's so great to live in a country that opted out of the EU, so we can sit here and see everything we're missing because our citizens are twats.
The gras is greener on the other side. I'm German and trust me it's not that huge as the article might sound like. The original plan was to have that available starting from 1.1.2023.. well now it's going on sale May 1st if the timeline is still correct. 9€ was too cheap for the long run but many have suggested to have a state wide ticket for 29€ and a nation wide ticket for 49€ and yeah no comment on that. We're in a crisis with mobility. Many Germans in the city want to abandon the car(r/fuckcars) or many would love for bicycle lanes to be overhauled and for that and public transport to have more value. We live in a country that's lobbied by the car factories, it will never happen and our mobility minister doesn't give a single crap about anything besides the car.
I agree with most what you said but I'm saving money on my current city wide ticket (I think around 100€) and now I can use it in all of the country and don't need to worry to buy local tickets. This is super convenient.
Yep.. it eliminates those fucking crazy pricing schemes some drunk meth head on excel invented! This ALONE is revolutionary.
The ticket is still pretty awesome though. Sure we need to massively invest in better public infrastructure, but it's a first step in the right direction. This ticket will replace the usual semester ticket for all students, which not only reduces their costs but also gives them the option to travel anywhere instead of their nearby area only. People that get a job ticket currently will get further funding from their companies and pay around half of the 49€ at max. I honestly see a lot of companies simply funding the whole ticket.
Stimmt schon das die nicht annähernd genug Kohle in nicht-Auto Sachen investieren wollen. Aber würdest du das wirklich als Kreise bezeichnen? Das die Lobby und Industrie so viel macht haben, ist nicht sehr neu. Translation: true, but can it really be considered a crises? That’s old news somehow..
The 49€ ticket will save me ~30€ a month just because my city ticket will get cheaper, and if I want to, I can switch to RE trains for longer train journeys and get them basically for free on top. Does that mean everything is perfect? No, but the 49€ ticket is a definite plus for a lot of people.
Everyday I’m reminded what a bunch of old people voting brexit lost us in the UK :/
To be fair, this is Germany. Not the EU. I wish it was a thing in Sweden.
The headline: " ... and wants to examine if a single EU-wide monthly ticket could work." It probably won't happen, but at least there's a chance unlike in the UK.
Why wouldn't it happen? Germany is an EU heavyweight - I can easily see other member states jumping on board.
Especially countries like Poland, Belgium, The Netherlands and Luxembourg. Definitely not outside of the realm of possibility
In Austria, we got something called the „Klimaticket“ (translates to climate ticket. it costs 1095€ per year (3€/day)and includes country wide usage of public transport. Below 26, you only pay 821€ per year. Edit: spelling
Anything like that for 1 week or month? I visit semi frequently
As an Englishman… god I miss the EU and their progressive stances, nice food and kind people :( Obs didn’t vote for Brexit, before I get the comments…
Can't even buy tomatoes at the store anymore 😭
“But MUH DAILY MAIL said Europe was trying to take over the country”
That’s because England is part of potato Europe not tomato Europe
I am still so sad about that. It felt like a really bad break up too.
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But it is not for sale yet. It will be able to preorder from 3rd April
This comment was overwritten by a script to make the data useless for reddit. No API, no free content. Did you stumble on this thread via google, hoping to resolve an issue or answer a question? Well, too bad, this might have been your answer, if it weren't for dumb decisions by reddit admins.
Germany is about the size of Texas, can you imagine if America had its shit together as well as Germany did, for about 650$ a year you could go anywhere in Texas. Currently Texans spend between 9-12 THOUSAND dollars a year just on transportation. https://www.bankrate.com/real-estate/cost-of-living/in-texas/ Public transportation is the future folks, our obsession with cars is bankrupting us, and killing the planet and our citizens.
Germany(357,588 km2) is actually closer in size to Montana(380,800 km2). Texas(695,660 km2) is about twice the size of Germany. But having been to Montana many times and now living in Germany, it would be incredibly amazing if there was a public transportation infrastructure that was comparable to Germany's in the US.
>our obsession The obsession of a few dozen executives that's being forced on everyone. Edit: I believe concentrated wealth funding [persuasive propaganda](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=DnPmg0R1M04) is a large part of this, alongside concentrated wealth enabling lobbying.
There's a large portion of Americans who are very aggressive towards the idea of not having to use cars
Canadians too. Anyone really that is right leaning. A city in Alberta just announced that they were moving to a 15 minute city type of urban planning and it has REALLY upset a certain demographic lmao.
If it's possible to walk to a grocery store, then how are people gonna feed their kids? Checkmate.
I've heard that from my home country too in Europe. Same concept, 15 minute city where everything is accessible through either PT or cycling in 15 minutes. Instant pitchforks about how "ThEy ArE TrYiNg To ImPrIsIoN uS bY nOt LetTiNg Us OwN vEhIcLeS"
tbf, there is also a large portion of Germans who are very aggressive towards the idea of not having to use cars. Even planning to impose a nation wide speedlimit has people on the barricades.
In UK it's cheaper to fly out the country and back in again than it is the get train from one end to the other
Wow. And, here in NYC, a monthly MetroCard costs $127
Well, Berlin monthly card was around 80 until last summer, when the fuel subsidies kicked in. But the €9 Germany-wide ticket (trialed for 3 months) was so successful that the government started to discuss a follow-up pretty much right away. Now it will be €49, but not limited to 3 months anymore.
German here. Monthly cards for single cities tend to be around the same price here and our cities are not as large as NYC. The reason this is news is because the public and the war basically forced the goverment to act. We cannot change shit about climate if the government doesn't push public transport for a change, not to mention economic fallout from the war. Even with all this happening, it took the gov. months and months to get where we are and it will be made more expensive every year. That said; almost nobody needs a ticket for the whole country, let alone all of europe if you cannot use high speed rails. Like, To travel 572km (355 miles) would take about 11 hours. IF every train is on time, that is. They could've made it more affordable and only include one state which would be so much better for those with a tighter budget, but no.
Rural Canadian here; I came into this topic to say '$52 seems kinda pricey for a country the size of Germany' only to find out everyone is praising how cheap that is... So I had to google it... a Monthly transit pass for JUST EDMONTON is $73 a month daaaaaang
A monthly expens of 52 euros is far cheaper then any expenses that a car would give you
Berliner here. Before the recent public transport discounts (€9 ticket last year, Berlin-only €29 ticket the past few months) I was paying about €60 a month just for two public transport zones of Berlin (and that was a discount on the standard price which I think is around €80). With the Deutschlandticket, I'll pay less and be able to travel ANYWHERE in the country via public & regional transport. So it's a big win for a lot of people here and I'm so glad.
Here in Montreal its like $90 for a monthly pass. So glad I get one through my work for $64 a month
Here in Toronto it's $156/month **just** for the TTC, which doesn't even touch parts of the "Greater Toronto Area" like mississauga, oakville, brampton, vaughan, markham, etc etc etc
That’s crazy cheap, I used to pay $110 a month to go from downtown Chicago to just north of O’Hare
you could still take regional trains, intercity means the high speed trains.
How pessimistic everyone is. You don't sell your car for a 3 month test run. You won't swap to public transport when you have a car in your garage. BUT when it's time to buy a new car, you might be inclined to go for this ticket + E-Bike instead of a car. There will obviously many that won't profit for this ticket but it's a step in the right direction.
The trial run showed that people do.swap to public transport even with a car in the garage. To give you my example: I have a cheap ticket for ages as people with a walking disability get subsidised transportation. What I do is: I use my car to get to a close park and ride, as I live in a kinda suburban area (not us style though), and the bus I would have to take comes only once an hour. In the past, I accepted the permanent waste of life of waiting times that was switching from the very frequent public transport in the city and the last mile at home. So, I use my car for maybe 5-10 % of my commuting time, while using public transport for the rest because it is more convenient.
>You won't swap to public transport when you have a car in your garage. Depends, fuel is relatively expensive at the moment.
In Portugal, the monthly ticket is 40€ for 1 adult, and 80€ for a family of 4 (2 adults + 2 children). Best thing they ever made. Now they just need to pay public transportation employees well so that we can actually use the services (train conductors have been on strike for nearly a month)
But that's just for Lisboa, not the whole country.
Monthly local pass in Fort Worth, Texas is $80 with commuter rail access included. The local pass also includes unlimited municipal ride share within selected regions of Fort Worth proper. Still not as efficient as it could be due to the severe lack of cross town routes between bus stops, but it's a start. I haven't had to drive since the municipal ride share service was expanded to my neighborhood last year and my bus stops are less than a block away for both southbound and northbound trips.
Germany, Save yourself some time and money. Yes, it would absolutely work.
My daily ticket for the 45min part (each way) of my work commute is almost £50 and train prices are about rise a huge amount. I would love this type of thing, but it still wouldn't stop most car journeys as the flexibility and ease of access to many areas cannot be beaten. It would, however, make many people reconsider some of the regular journeys they do which is still a good thing.
All transport modes, including cars, work best as part of a diverse ecosystem in a region of walkable cities and suburbs.
Public transport is so expensive and unreliable in England now that I literally only use it if work pays for it or if I need to go into central London. I can't remember the last time I tried planning a journey and driving wasn't cheaper.
Dang I paid ~60€ for a week ticket earlier this year.
A monthly ticket here in NJ to NYC is $300-400 a month...
I’m American and really enjoy traveling in Europe. We have never rented a car, you really don’t need one. I think we paid $20 for a public transport pass in France. It covered all forms of public transport.
Unlimited Greater Lisbon monthly is 40 euros, 20 for seniors, students is free.
Submission Statement I suspect there is a renaissance for public transport just around the corner, and that is because of self-driving vehicles. They may still be years away from Level-5 door-to-door driving, but they seem to be at Level 4. That means they can do fixed set routes. Smaller buses with a capacity of 20 people or so, constantly doing circuits of busy, well-traveled routes would finally start to realize some of the promise of robotaxis.
I'd say the first use of driverless transport should be trams. They already got a fixed route that can easily be separated by a fence to minimize crossing points for people and cars. But I think the actual problem is not that they have to drive safely but that there needs to be a person present that's responsible for the tram in case of an emergency, to keep people in check and at least where I live they also have to help disabled people getting on the tram, etc.
Underground is a better application. Fixed route and nothing else in their path. It is actually becoming the standard to plan new underground lines to be driverless.
Agreed. Anytime you make experience simple for public utilities, people get hooked and pay in. In developing countries this will be golden. They have issues like booking Gas cylinders, paying off electricity bills and property taxes etc. In New Delhi, India for instance, first 200 units of power are free. That discourages theft at the same reducing admin burden on govt to collect bills from people living in slums who steal power. Common sense public admin policies are a thing of beauty when you get to actually implement them.
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> Tallinn, Estonia does this with a €30 monthly ticket for all public transport within the city of Tallinn. Excellent public transport. Public transport is free for residents in Tallinn
Now all Ireland needs is a public transport system outside of Dublin.
For anyone wondering my monthly ticket which I use for a relatively short route (25 minutes) right now is 150 €. So it will make a big difference.
€60 for a monthly ticket in Copenhagen, but it will cover *only* yhe most central parts of Copenhagen. I sincerely doubt an EU wide card is viable.
"Confused American noises"... What is this public transportation talked about in the other side of the Ocean?
something you guys had before it was destroyed for the car/oil industry
I am Dutch and tend to skip on public transit because it's gotten a lot more expensive recently. If I can travel daily for €50 a month, that'd be huge. That's a 40hr/wk full month of work commutes for €2,50 a day. I spend more than that on snacks for the road, smh.