Frans Timmermans denounces European train companies: ‘I’m sick of it’. European railroad companies have three months to come up with a plan for a merged ticketing system, otherwise a booking app will be forced upon them by the European Commission

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  1. European railroad companies have three more months to come up with a plan for a merged ticketing system, otherwise they will have a booking app forced on them by the European Commission. So says Vice President Frans Timmermans in the BNR Europe podcast. ‘I am also fed up with it. People want to take the train, but you have to make it easier for them.’

    The Commission would like to see European travelers choose trains much more often than planes. For European rail travelers, however, fragmented travel information and unclear ticket prices are a major obstacle. Timmermans therefore sees a European booking app as one of the solutions.

    ‘My goal is to make sure that you can order a ticket much easier via your cell phone. Once we make that easy, at least within a 600 to 800 kilometer radius, people will prefer to go by train rather than by plane,’ says Timmermans. Last year, the Commission also put an action plan on the table. It was not known then that the railroad companies were given the end of this year as an ultimatum for, among other things, improved data exchange.

    Timmermans said that European train companies could take an example from countries such as Switzerland and Austria, where railroad companies are better coordinated and make it easy for citizens to take the train: “Let’s take inspiration from that.

    Timmermans also referred to the German measure of the “9-euro ticket,” which was recently implemented in Germany. This measure led to a doubling of train travel: ‘That seems to be something that sticks – once people get used to it they start doing it more often,’ Timmermans said.

  5. Great news. We ought to promote the rail much more as a ecologically (and, hopefully, with some more effort) economically beneficial alternative to flying for long range transport. That endeavor is deeply handicapped when booking a rail connection Frankfurt – Nantes takes ten times as long as booking a flight.

  6. > ‘That seems to be something that sticks – once people get used to it they start doing it more often,’ Timmermans said.

    Anyone have a source that corroborates that people take public transport more often now in Germany? That’s the first I’ve heard of that, and it doesn’t seem super plausible considering how bad the quality of service was (it was already kinda ho-hum before, but during those 3 months it was even worse due to frequent overcrowding).

    Also, yes please!

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