Transport: Social association: Local transport should remain cheap in the long term

Even after the expiry of the 9-euro ticket, the German social association is demanding cheap local and regional transport – and wants to reallocate money earmarked for road construction.

“Politics must now seize the opportunity and set long-term course for sustainable and affordable mobility by improving public transport and local transport and making it affordable for everyone,” said Adolf Bauer, President of the social association, the Funke media group (Wednesday). As an example of such offers, he named a “365-euro annual ticket”.

The demand for the 9-euro ticket has shown how great the potential for use in public transport is, said Bauer. “This dynamic must be used to develop a permanently discounted offer for public transport tickets and to massively expand the infrastructure.” To finance these measures, the association proposes reallocating funds, “for example, from building new roads to public transport and redesigning the existing road space”.

Federal Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) recently rejected a follow-up rule for the 9-euro ticket. The chairwoman of the conference of transport ministers, Maike Schaefer, spoke in favor of this. “In principle, this is comparable to the long-standing demand of the federal states for a massive increase in regionalization funds in order to prevent fares from increasing after August,” said the Green politician to the editorial network Germany (RND / Wednesday). “But in addition to such a ticket that is valid nationwide from the immediate climate protection program, the federal states still need higher regionalization funds for better travel times, more vehicles and more infrastructure.”