[server_man3000]

Didn’t this start as unlimited anywhere for 9 euros no strings attached?

I LOVE the German transit system (although Denmark wins in cleanliness). However, Germany is a bit predatory with this new system. You can ONLY purchase this ticket as a subscription model. If you’re a tourist, you must cancel before the 10th of the month or you get auto rebilled.

Additionally, there are so many apps that resell the ticket as some white label system, so it was very confusing to purchase (you cannot buy them at the machines).

The price hike is the wrong direction here if we are reducing that much time on the road. Kudos though for the great rail systems. The USA has a lot to learn here and it’s baffling how terrible it is here. I doubt I’d ever need a car in Germany given the rail system was much more convenient. In the USA I spend 10-15 mins trying to park any time I go anywhere

[lispm]

> Didn’t this start as unlimited anywhere for 9 euros no strings attached?

That was a time limited earlier ticket. "The tickets were valid for June, July, or August 2022. The offer aimed at reducing energy use amid the 2021–2022 global energy crisis." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9-Euro-Ticket

It influenced the idea to come up with a permanent ticket: the "Deutschlandticket". It started 1. Mai 2023. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deutschlandticket

The Deutschlandticket costs max 49 Euros (next year it will cost 58€ per month) and is valid for one month for mostly all local&regional public transport systems (plus a few selected non-regional trains) in the whole of Germany. The subscription will renew automatically.

Companies often support employees by paying some of the costs. Then it typically costs 34.30 € per month. From next year on, employees pay 40,60 € per month max.

Here in my home city already 94% of the 213000 pupils use the Deutschlandticket for 0 € per month. Every pupil has free access to all of the country's local&regional public transport system... I find that kind of mind-blowing.

I have the ticket in my iPhone's wallet and thus also in the Apple Watch wallet. Additionally I need an ID card. Which at some point in time will also come to the smartphone. https://www.iamexpat.de/expat-info/german-expat-news/new-mob...

[consp]

> Every pupil has free access to all of the country's local&regional public transport system... I find that kind of mind-blowing.

We've had this since the 1990s for higher education students. One of the known effects is that students who got it, used the public transport systems more often after wards as they were more familiar with it. I would not be surprised if Germany has a simmilar effect. The problem with these effect is they far outgrow the attention span of polititians as they take years to come to full force.

[riedel]

I only pay 20 EUR a month because a 25 EUR subsidy by my employer. It is a total nobrainer although, I often even use it less, just because I can jump on any local train, tram, bus without worrying about a ticket (particularly as we don't have NFC payment). Actually the 9 EUR will effectively mean a 50% raise for me, so I am not sure if the raise even makes sense economically because people like me just would cancel.

[Hugsun]

It sounds amazing. All these prices seem crazy low. A significantly zone limited monthly commuter ticket here in Denmark costs over 500€

[mk89]

And if I am not mistaken, as a university student you get also that ticket for free and you just need to show your student card.

So students basically never have to pay for the public transportation which is really awesome.

EDIT: by public transportation I mean whatever is included in the D-Ticket (no Intercity or similar types of trains).

[weinzierl]

"I LOVE the German transit system"

I have some experience with the public transport systems in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France and Belgium. In my opinion Germany's is the worst. Everything seems to be stuck in paper based processes, only occasionally and very listlessly digitized. The tariffs (apart from the Deutschlandticket) are overly complicated and suffer heavily under the common balkanization.

The DB Navigator is so terrible that I try to book the German leg of my international travels from one of the other countries apps whenever possible.

For a counter example look at the French SNCF Connect app. It is not perfect but it is a pretty workable solution.

[jonp888]

> The DB Navigator is so terrible that I try to book the German leg of my international travels from one of the other countries apps whenever possible.

> For a counter example look at the French SNCF Connect app. It is not perfect but it is a pretty workable solution.

I am extremely surprised that you would write this. The SNCF Connect app has a lot of problems. Just for starters, it can't cope with any journey with more than 2 changes. SNCF shut down there international ticket sales computer system - because it was too old. They no longer sell any international tickets, unless it's on a train actually run by SNCF.

The DB App has train services for the whole of Europe. It can plan a journey from Oslo to Sofia if required.

[nonrandomstring]

> Everything seems to be stuck in paper based processes,

It is for that reason I'd love it. Accessible, universal, sustainable, resilient technology!

I once got stuck in Nuremberg overnight. The ticket office was open all night and an official looked up all my options from memory and timetable books and wrote me a diagram with pen and paper that perfectly showed me how to get to my destination. I'll never forget that helpful clerk.

Not saying you can't have your apps, but systems that lose touch with reality and human involvement are part of the emerging problem.

For my mind the smartest ticket technology I ever saw was Hungarian and used on the Budapest transit system in the 1980s - some devious discrete mathematics that coded the journey stops, used status, and allowed routes all in a matrix of hole punches on a small paper ticket. The punches (that you had to use when getting on trains, buses and trams) were purely mechanical, and so was the validating machine used by inspectors/conductors to see if you had punched your ticket. Simply genius.

[cycomanic]

I don't know about apps (only used the HVV app, for holding a ticket), but in terms of websites SNCF (at least the English version, the French one is a bit better) is an absolute mess. There is like 3 different ones for starters, one to find a connection, one to buy the ticket and one to find current status/delays.

bahn.de is actually one of the more decent websites in my opinion (definitely better than most rail sites I have encountered).

That said, the biggest problem with rail in Europe atm, is the lack of an integrated ticketing system. Going between places by train is a so much nicer experience than taking the plane, but the ticketing experience is such a mess. As others have pointed out, on SNCF you can't find any international connections any longer (IIRC SJ.se in Sweden still shows connections to Norway and Denmark), on Bahn.de you can find the connections, but can't actually see a price or book a ticket (you are told to go into a station). Train travel in Europe could be a surely awesome otherwise.

[hagbard_c]

> The DB Navigator is so terrible that I try to book the German leg of my international travels from one of the other countries apps whenever possible.

While DB Navigator does leave something to be desired the sheer width/breadth of the DB booking system makes it my go-to choice for international train travel. They're also quite forthcoming in paying back 25% to 50% of the ticket price when delayed more than 1 or 2 hours which is a frequent occurrence on the longer trips - from Sweden to the Netherlands - which I make about every other month. I can get prices directly without having to go through some silly booking agency, I can book tickets, reserve seats and sometimes actually choose which seats I want (something which doesn't always work). They did have some problems about a year ago when they moved to the 'new' DB Navigator and the price I was quoted suddenly quadrupled, this turned out to be an omission in the booking system which I submitted a bug report for. They fixed the problem and prices returned to where they should be (about 5% higher than before the change, they used the opportunity to raise prices...).

No, the problem with DB is not to be found in their app or the booking system, those are at least on par and often better than their foreign equivalents. The problem lies in the unreliability of the long distance network, especially the ICE service which often sees long delays due to a lack of personnel, defective equipment, maintenance work, etc. Regional services tend to be more reliable, in part due to the higher frequency which makes it less of a problem if a single train does not run. All in all I can live with the problems and have switched over to rail travel whenever I can in Europe. The advantages - more space, more comfort, no security theatre, the ability to hack away while travelling, usually lower prices, I can take as much luggage as I can carry (which is a lot) - outweigh the disadvantages - longer travel times, need to change trains, delays which compound due to missing connections.

[Gravityloss]

One fun experience, arriving in München and trying to buy ticket for the airport train online. The app requires your birthdate. The date selector starts from present and only allows to go back one month at a time. So if you're 40 years old, you would need to click 480 times... We bought paper tickets from a machine . Machines work well compared to other countries though.

[taffer]

I couldn't disagree more. You can say a lot of bad things about Deutsche Bahn, but of all the travel apps I have used, DB Navigator and bahn.de were the best.

SNCF Connect, on the other hand, not only had a terrible UX, but also crashed randomly, forcing me to use third-party apps to buy SNCF tickets.

[psychoslave]

I can't tell for other countries, but SNCF digital solutions have been a great example of everything you should not do for as long as I can remember. Actually bahn.de used to be a far better interface to consult french train hours than whatever fancy new name SNCF would come every few months or so.

[barrkel]

The DB navigator app is actually decent. The one downside is it kicks you out to a website to book many international tickets, but you can still plan and track your journey delays etc. in the app.

[locallost]

I agree with the part about complicated tariffs/tickets but not much else. Although not sure how many countries make it simple, the only one I am aware of is Switzerland which conveniently solves the problem by making everything expensive.

I use the app and bahn.de and things are generally pretty easy and just work. I haven't used paper in a while, recently once because my phone battery ran out, but that's it. Finding connections, adjusting options like transfer time, where you want to transfer, buying tickets, checking in through the app, getting notifications about changing trains, and even recently some things I never did like getting an invoice for my employer are all a breeze. It fails rarely and is in general slick. Recently I bought tickets through Hungarian railways and this was a pain in the ass.

The one annoyance I have is buying regional tickets, where you have to buy them one at a time which can be a hassle if you travel with e.g. three people and you want to buy tickets for all of them.

[ted_dunning]

I just used the DB Navigator for extensive travel in Germany without any problems. It doesn't provide quite as much information about how to deal with connections for a delayed train, but that is minor compared to the very transparent function for buying and displaying tickets.

[elpocko]

>Everything seems to be stuck in paper based processes

I want to buy a ticket every now and then. I want that process to be straight forward: cash money for one-time ticket. I don't want your app on my phone, I don't want a subscription, and I don't want to be tracked.

Paper based offline processes forever, please.

[dietr1ch]

As a tourist I agree, and the Deutschland Ticket App is Region locked, so you are bound to the complexity of the system, which seems unnecessary and way too expensive as opposed to the ticket locals get.

[lispm]

> Everything seems to be stuck in paper based processes, only occasionally and very listlessly digitized.

That's nonsense. Most public transport is digital by now.

> The DB Navigator is so terrible

It's not terrible. I managed to book all my train travels just fine with it, also using a business bahncard which gives me a 50% discount on all trains.

[serial_dev]

> I doubt I’d ever need a car in Germany given the rail system was much more convenient

Sure, if you live in a larger city and you never leave… I lived in Munich for years and never needed a car, just comfortable shoes, a bike and occasionally a transport ticket.

Try to get to a smaller town or village, you are lucky if you only spend twice as much time getting there as with a car.

The trains get randomly cancelled, delay is basically guaranteed, the workers go on strikes relatively frequently, so you can never rely on trains working for anything remotely important.

[emaro]

Surprised how positive you're writivg about the German public transport. The Deutsche Bahn doesn't have a good reputation in central Europe.

I guess my frame of reference isn't average, given I live in Switzerland.

Edit: the 49-euro ticket is great though!

[0x008]

Of course your frame of reference is biased because you have the best railway system out of ~30 European countries.

Germany’s system gets a lot of hate but it still in the top ~8 or so.

[ben_w]

As a UK citizen living in Berlin, I assure you that for all the cancellations and repair works, there's many places which look up to the German system.

(I've also been to the USA, and (IMO) Amtrak makes the UK look good).

[caskstrength]

> Edit: the 49-euro ticket is great though!

As a Swiss person you want appreciate German tax rates that subsidize that 49-euro tickets. The money has always got to come from somewhere.

[onli]

> If you’re a tourist, you must cancel before the 10th of the month or you get auto rebilled.

Just in case this is helpful to someone, you can buy the ticket from one of those different transport organizations you mentioned and avoid that time limit to cancel. The one to use for that is https://www.mopla.solutions/, it's a simple app (alternatively web site) that worked really well for me (no affiliation).

[jonp888]

> Didn’t this start as unlimited anywhere for 9 euros no strings attached?

The €9 ticket was a 3 month temporary offer, which was not originally intended to continue permanently at all.

> I LOVE the German transit system (although Denmark wins in cleanliness). However, Germany is a bit predatory with this new system. You can ONLY purchase this ticket as a subscription model. If you’re a tourist, you must cancel before the 10th of the month or you get auto rebilled.

The ticket is subsidised by the German government(beyond the amount that all rail infrastructure and most services are subsidised) for the purpose what is covered in the article - encouraging permanent modal shift of regular travellers(primarily commuters) from road to rail. If you're a tourist, it's not meant for you. Sorry.

[sadcherry]

Airtravel is also subsidised by the German tax payer. Much more than the 49 EUR ticket. No matter if you are a tourist or not. (Arguably mostly for tourists actually.)

[lispm]

> If you're a tourist, it's not meant for you. Sorry.

Tourist&foreigners can use the Deutschlandticket, too.

But: it's a monthly subscription automatically renewing every month, so one has to cancel it early enough when planning to leave the country. You'll also typically need a smartphone for the ticket.

[luto]

It started with 9€, is 49€ now, and will be 58€ starting 2025.

You can buy for a single month when booking through the right company. "mo.pal" is a good one, for example. However, I agree that it is a bit predatory.

[sva_]

> You can ONLY purchase this ticket as a subscription model. If you’re a tourist, you must cancel before the 10th of the month or you get auto rebilled.

Pro tip: some websites offer to start the subscription later in the month and you only pay for those days. So if, for example, you were to attend a certain hacker conference in Hamburg at the end of December, you could buy the ticket for the last 5 days of the month for 49/31*5 euro. Just have to cancel before 10th of December so that it doesn't renew. ("HVV Switch" App)

[tgsovlerkhgsel]

All of these tickets are only for local/regional trains, not the faster/long-distance trains. You can get from one end of the country to another by changing trains a few time, but e.g. getting from Munich to Berlin would be 6h (direct) with fast trains and 10+ h (changing 3 times) with the regional ones.

The subscription model is intentional - this isn't meant to help tourists or to be bought when you need it, it's meant to make sure people have already pre-paid the cost when making a decision whether to take a train or a car (by being cheap enough that people subscribe even if they don't use it all the time).

[carrja99]

As a tourist, the cost was well worth it. Used buses and rail to get everywhere, booked one DB train from Berlin to Bamberg but otherwise travelled all over Germany during my time there.

Just had to remember to cancel.

[dgellow]

It’s not really made for tourists from outside the country, you already have special tickets for people who visit for a short time. It’s for the local population. The price hike is from 49€/month to 58€/month next year. It’s the opposite of predatory IMHO, you have it on your mobile app in a few tap and can cancel easily

[luplex]

Yep, it's not really meant for tourists. They really want everyone to stay in the subscription model, because it's heavily subsidized, so they need to hit a high enough LTV anyways.

[happyraul]

Cancellation terms vary by vendor. With some better ones, you can cancel 24 hours before the end of the month to avoid being billed for the next month.

[2-3-7-43-1807]

> is a bit predatory

what bugs me the most is that i can only book it for a specific calendar month. that is _so_ stupid ...

[bowsamic]

> Didn’t this start as unlimited anywhere for 9 euros no strings attached?

No, you could never use it on IC or ICEs

[consumerx]

True, significant only because offered for 9 EUR initially.

[ben_w]

Not only — when I visit friends in the UK, I've had single rail tickets cost more than the increased next years' cost of a monthly nationwide ticket here in Germany.

[hilux]

I'm a big fan of public transit, but it's not entirely "baffling" why the US lags European countries (and Japan) - the US is a MUCH larger country.

[lispm]

> the US is a MUCH larger country

with much of the population in a few denser areas, where public transport would make a lot of sense.

[cycomanic]

The size "excuse" is often brought up, I don't think that's valid though, e.g. Sweden with a significantly lower density has much better public transport. Or if we talk absolute size I think even Russia has a better rail transport system than the US for example. Like usual I think it can largely be attributed politics and to the strength of the car lobby in the US (as well as a weird desire to "stick it to poor people"), which caused a complete focus on individual travel.

[server_man3000]

There’s a happy medium somewhere though and the US doesn’t meet it at all. I can’t even take a bus from my neighborhood in a California city to the grocery store in a timely manner and it’s often cancelled

[ben_w]

The EU is only about half the land area of the USA; Germany is roughly equivalent of the fourth largest US state, Montana, and only CA, TX, and AK are bigger.

Do any states have something equivalent to this?

[mitthrowaway2]

Somehow that wasn't as much of an obstacle in 1920!

[reducesuffering]

But the DC to Boston line isn't

[oersted]

I don't have the details, but every single time I have heard the mention of Deutsche Bahn in the last few years it has been accompanied by comments of how broken it has become, with constant delays and cancellations, to the point where for many people it is no longer a viable option for commute or for anything where you cannot risk to be up to several hours late.

I guess it's all relative. If you come to rely on an excellent and omnipresent rail service for many years as a society, the impacts are quite big when it stops working well. If the service itself is built assuming reliability, where transferring between trains is common, then issues can get substantially amplified if that choreography gets somewhat disrupted.

[sadcherry]

There is a big reporting bias though. You won't see in the news "of the 40,000 railway connections today, most were on time". You only read about some train having had an AC issue or the like.

I have family in Germany and they never go by train but tell me regularly about how bad the train has become. They have literally not been in one for 15+ years. But they watch the news every day.

[nisa]

Long distance trains are getting more unreliable (ICE, IC) due to repair works on the tracks - regional / local trains are mostly fine (at least in my place here) and I can't remember the last time there was an delay longer than 10 minutes here. However lately I've saw that trains are cancelled due to manpower shortages and due to the nature the local trains are organized (there is a tender and a railway company wins that tender for 5 years with the same rolling stock) peaks in capacity like on the weekend are not dealt with.

[dustyventure]

It was broken long before the offer though so the reduction in driving being moderate probably reflects fewer shifts in daily commute and mostly more leisure usage.

[rudnevr]

Last time I frequented Boston Amtrak it would delay about 28% of travel.

[juliangmp]

>I LOVE the German transit system

What? How? I have the ticket and despite that I never use any regional train because they're generally awful. (Local busses and trams on the other hand work pretty well)

[ahartmetz]

Regional trains are really okay compared to long-distance trains. These are so bad that it's unlikely that you reach your destination on time now.

[geraldwhen]

Germany is smaller than California. The United States is very, very large place, mostly unpopulated. It’s hard to apply whatever Germany, a small, densely populated country does to the US, which is largely empty land.

[Larrikin]

Why do we have to pretend that routes between Montana and South Dakota have to come up when discussing ways of improving rail usage in the US? We could treat routes between Chicago, Milwaukee, and Indianapolis like Germany. We could treat high speed rail in California or the Northeast like Japan. Choosing to live in an extremely rural area shouldn't just be a "well it doesn't help" me trump card to defeat things that will help most of the population.

[shantara]

And how many people regularly commute across the United States? The absolute majority of the journeys people make regularly is still quite short, so why not start by optimizing for them? Then continue with building high speed intercity connections between the urban areas with <500 km distance to create valuable alternatives to being stuck in the highway traffic and dealing with the airport security nonsense.

Why do you always think that you need to reinvent a tried and true solutions that have been proven to work across the world?

[waveBidder]

Look, nobody is talking about Nebraska. the density of the east coast is easily high enough to support high speed high quality rail.

[ben_w]

1. CA is the 3rd largest state in the USA. Do any of the 47 smaller states have something like this?

2. As the unpopulated bits necessarily don't have many people or things to do in them, the cost of subsidising a public transit ticket in those places is necessarily small.