9€ Revisited

 It has been about a month and since the implementation of the 9€ Ticket here in Germany on the first of June. In my last post on the subject I claimed that "[The 9€ Ticket] very well could be the type of thing that changes the way Germany conceptualizes it's transit network." and after a month of personal experience and an outpouring of public opinion I feel the time is right to once again put pen to paper and explore the deaths of 9€ Deutschland. 

So the first thing I want to say is, never in my life have I experienced a policy so socially pervasive at the 9€ Ticket. It holds the type of esteem and infamy which local projects (Stuttgart 21) can sometimes gain amongst a population, but on a national scale. There is no one in Germany right now that does not have an opinion on the 9€ Ticket. Whether as a user, a critic, a sceptic, or a devotee I could (and have) asked total strangers about this ticket. 

At the offset there were concerns over capacity of the rail network meeting the increase in demand offered by the incentives provided through the subsidized ticket were present. Even passionate supporters of the 9€ Ticket, such as myself, were hesitant to see it as a golden ticket. What was harder to support and impossible to ignore are the amount of overcrowded trains and delays which are easily attributable to 9€ passengers.

 

Now is the time where I share my personal anecdote where I looked into the cold black eyes of the 9€ Ticket and still traveled across half of the country. This past week I traveled from Tübingen to Suhl exclusively with my 9€ Ticket and in the process was met with every counter argument one could weigh against the 9€ Ticket.

As this map demonstrates, it should take between five and a half to six hours to complete this jounrey. The travel time owes itself largely to unavoidable layovers, and Suhl not being the most popular destination with only 1 train running the line per hour.

All of that is the polite way to say every one of my trains was delayed, and while it made the process easier for me (cutting down the amount of time I had to spend outside in Bayern) it is apparent that anyone on a short time frame  would not be happy.

Demand is at the point where each stop takes about a minute longer (let's say) for regional trains. If there are 20 stops on a route that train is 20 minutes late. On board is not much better, as many of the regional trains don't have working air conditioning and the reason these delays are happening is more people are on the train. On my way back from Suhl to Würzburg I stood with 35 of my new closest friends outside the seating cabin, touching everytime the train rattled in 30 degree heat. I am yet to discover a place where people are more forthcoming with their opinions on the 9€ Ticket.

It seems that in its present form the 9€ Ticket is an enthusiastic failure. People are using it so much that it broke everything. The apparent misgivings of the 9€ Ticket has led to a tug of war where opponents of the ticket will claim that the above situation is bad and therefore should be abandoned. Others will say it's bad but the demand demonstrates this is a worthy pursuit, and others still who think the program should be seasonal or permanent but at least work next time. And when i hear these conversations I am hearing them on train platforms and squished between a wall and a family's suitcase. If the 9€ Ticket is the framing then the cultural discourse is the product. It is a unique time to be in Germany and people don't appear afraid to work through what that means in the time they have been provided by DB, as they wait for their delayed train.