Europe -wide comparison
Greenpeace: Climate -friendly train often more expensive than flight
Train or plane? At least when traveling up to 1,500 kilometers away, customers have the choice. Greenpeace compared the prices and demands changes.
When traveling to European city goals, the more climate -friendly train is often more expensive than the plane. According to a price comparison of Greenpeace, train trips are more expensive than a flight on 66 out of 142 examined European connections. This corresponds to a share of 46.5 percent, as the environmental protection organization reports.
According to the study, the more climate -damaging aircraft has the nose ahead, especially on the 109 cross -border connections. Flying is cheaper here in 54 percent of cases.
Including the 33 domestic flights examined, there is also a share of 46.5 percent of the routes on which the flight ticket is more expensive. With the missing 7 percent, no clear statement can be made.
Greenpeace: Train must always be cheaper
Greenpeace calls for higher taxes on air travel and relief for rail customers. “It is unjust that longer trips by train are so expensive, while flights are massively subsidized by tax exemptions and relief,” says traffic expert Lena Donat. “You travel by train, so it has to be cheaper than flying everywhere.”
For the study, the respective prices for one-way tickets at nine booking times were compared on 142 city connections with a maximum of 1,500 kilometers away. Subscription advantages, for example, via frequent flyer programs or railway cards were left out. The organization assumes that the fare for consumers is an important criterion when choosing the means of transport.
The costs for luggage transport were not taken into account in the analysis. While there are usually no extra income on train travel, direct flight airlines on their flights only allow a small hand luggage piece per passenger free of charge. At least for travel with a longer stay, this results in a price advantage for the train. Even the cheaper conditions for taking children on the train did not flow into the evaluation.
Inner German cheaper by train
On the 31 routes that touch Germany, the train journey is cheaper on 15 routes (48 percent). The two domestic connections Hamburg-Munich and Stuttgart-Berlin contained therein are always cheaper to master on the rail than with the plane.
With international train connections from and Germany, it becomes more expensive towards Western Europe and the aircraft is often cheaper. Train journeys to Poland, the Czech Republic, Austria and Belgium are almost always cheaper than flying.
Compared to the previous study from 2023, the Europe -wide price comparison has shifted in favor of the train trips. With the 111 comparable routes, 41 percent were now cheaper to cope with the train than by plane. Two years earlier it was only 27 percent. Donat describes the development as a glimmer of hope.
dpa
Source: Stern
