Attention, a revolution begins on Monday! Don't worry, it won't be held on the streets. At most a little, on the city bus. But especially by rail. And it will remain peaceful. Finally, the Deutschland-Ticket, which has been discussed for months and has long been controversial because of the financing, will be usable.
Dyrk Scherff
Editor in the "Value" section of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung.
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It makes public transport cheaper and easier. For only 49 euros a month, ticket holders can use the S-Bahn and U-Bahn, trams and local buses, regional trains and even some ferries in Berlin and Hamburg throughout Germany. Every single trip is then free of charge. When staying in a foreign city, no one has to worry about the peculiarities of the local tariff system.
Actually, the ticket was supposed to revolutionize local transport, i.e. distances of less than 50 kilometers. But since regional express trains can also be used, which cover much longer distances, journeys throughout the country are possible with the Deutschland-Ticket. This makes the alternatives of long-distance buses and long-distance trains, i.e. especially ICE and IC, less attractive because a single ticket has to be purchased for each journey.
The F.A.S. has analysed this for 16 important routes. The travel time in the three means of transport was queried. The focus was on medium-long distances. This is where the question of the means of transport is likely to arise most frequently. On very long distances, the regional train will take too long for most people. Unless they are absolute bargain hunters who want to save the ticket cost for the faster ICE.
In addition, we have also determined the fare of the express trains, which the holders of the Deutschland-Ticket save. The assumption was that the respective train ride would be booked one week in advance. The cheapest prices were then usually the super saver fares, which only apply to a special train. The flexible train tickets were usually more expensive. We quote the lowest price if the buyer has a Bahncard 50. This gives a 25 percent discount on the super saver prices and the saver prices. Without this advantage card, the price is correspondingly higher. For comparison, we have also included the cheapest price from Flixbus, the leader in long-distance buses.
The regional train depends on the long-distance bus
The result of the extensive analysis is very revealing. First of all, it shows how much the long-distance bus is losing its attractiveness. At nine to 22 euros, the fares are always cheaper than the journey with the ICE, depending on the length of the route, even if sometimes only a few euros. Of course, they are always more expensive than the regional trains, which can be used by holders of a Germany ticket at no additional cost. The surcharge for the long-distance bus could be justified if it offered some advantages over the regional express. The advantage is usually not a shorter travel time, as the F.A.S. analysis shows. On ten of the 16 routes examined, the regional train is faster than the long-distance bus, sometimes only a few minutes, but sometimes more than half an hour. The trains only take much longer on the Hamburg–Berlin and Frankfurt–Cologne routes.