To enjoy: this moment when the Federal Minister of Transport announced a new German motorway miracle to fulfill his share of climate protection obligations, five-lane highways in every direction, and freed the liberal activist spirit from the combustion tank. Take that, Greta! Volker Wissing also said that science had to be followed when it came to traffic. The traffic forecasts are clear, the traffic is increasing enormously. In other words: Stir up the asphalt.

With the same logic and the mobility know-how of the somewhat rusty manta driver, his party is currently paving various websites with asphalt wisdom: "For 72%, the car is indispensable," says a survey in magenta script on yellow tiles. But why two-thirds of respondents do not think of a viable alternative to the car even in metropolitan areas is not there. Wissing, after all, has the "reality of life" in his Twitter view: outdated rail network, he writes, a patchwork of construction sites, delays and "reversal of the infrastructure".

That's why Deutsche Bahn reacted lightning fast this week and has already registered the 80-billion-euro double rail boom. So now the wild ride really starts. A head-to-head race at the traffic lights, and Wissing defiantly leans out of the window. In Wales, the government has pulled the handbrake at full speed in a similar situation: For years, the Ministry of Transport has just complained in the social media, attempts had been made to get traffic under control by building roads. In vain. "More roads and more lanes led to more and more traffic – like everywhere else in the world." Admittedly, simple empirical knowledge. But at least not a caricature of science.