German political instability stalls DB's punctuality drive

Tyler Bosselman was wearing the dark blue vest and the red tie of a Deutsche Bahntrain driver. As he sat comfortably in the operator's seat of his regional DB train, the landscapes of southern Germany rushed by outside, reflected in his sunglasses.

Construction is underway on one of the routes that the 24-year-old Bosselman drives. It's the busy Riedbahn route between Frankfurt and Mannheim in Germany, which is getting new switches and signals to make rail traffic run more smoothly. The goal is to finish the overhaul by the end of December, and Bosselman hopes that the upgrade will make Deutsche Bahn "more reliable overall."

Reconstruction of the Riedbahn route marks the beginning of what Germany's state-owned railway operator touted as a reboot of the company, with routes to Hanover, Hamburg and other busy sections of its nationwide network set to follow soon.

DB's so-called comprehensive reconstruction plan involves a total of 40 major construction projects and aims to ensure that the operator's infamously unpunctual trains will be running on time again by the end of the decade. At the program's launch this summer, German Transportation Minister Volker Wissing called it Germany's "largest reconstruction and modernization program in recent decades."

'Like you're gambling'

DB's plans could soon come to a screeching halt. The collapse of the three-party German government coalition on November 4, and fresh elections to be held on February 23 next year at the earliest, mean the country is stuck in political limbo for half a year, and so is funding for the rail program.

Martin Burkert, chairman of the EVG rail workers union, has already warned that, without a 2025 national budget, there would be a lack of money to carry on with the projects. "Years of planning work to finally get the infrastructure up to date and improve the punctuality and capacity of the network is now at risk," Burkert told the German news agency, dpa, recently.

Bosselman knows all too well how necessary the overhaul of DB's rail network is. Every day, the train driver navigates his engine through a web of construction sites in and around the Frankfurt rail hub. "It's like when you are going to a casino. It's like you're gambling and hoping that you are on time. During rush hours, there is absolutely no guarantee that you are getting there in any reasonable time," Bosselman told DW.

An active union member, Bosselman can share many stories about what goes wrong at DB. While most regional trains still manage to be fairly punctual, he says, almost one in three long-distance trains in Germany now arrives late. Yet they are usually given priority on the crowded tracks thus holding up slower trains or idling them on sidetracks until they pass by. "It doesn't matter if it is on a Monday, a Wednesday or any other day in the week. You can basically mark the day in your calendar that you make it into Frankfurt central station without having to slow down once."

Underfunded German railroads

DB's infrastructure backlog is not only evident in the carrier's lack of punctuality, but has also increasingly manifested itself in a thinned-out network that has been shrinking for years. Surprisingly, this has happened against the backdrop of rising demand for its services, with goods volumes and passenger numbers having increased at the same time.

Bosselman said you could see the ruins left by a chronically underfunded rail company every day. As we pass a steel bridge, he points to rusty, moss-covered tracks nearby, which he says have been disused for a long time. "You could have a much higher volume of traffic here, if you invested a few euros into this replacement track."

At the end of the 1990s, Germany was hit by a severe economic crisis, with the government cutting spending wherever possible. Deutsche Bahn, which is fully owned by the state, became an easy target for the cuts leading to a dramatic decline of investment in rail infrastructure.

Although this has changed in recent years, the government still spends comparatively little money on Germany's railway infrastructure. According to the Pro-Rail Alliance — a lobby group that unites nonprofit pro-rail campaigners with railway sector companies — Germany spends about €115 ($121) per capita on its railways annually, while countries such as Austria or Switzerland invest three to four times as much.

Budget constraints hit

The Federal Court of Auditors — an independent body that audits the federal budget and oversees the management of public funds — highlighted the years of neglect and current underfunding in a recent report. It declared Deutsche Bahn a "case for restructuring," and lambasted the government for having "failed to address key rail policy questions for three decades."

The comprehensive reconstruction plan was supposed to be the answer to many of DB's woes, with the government earmarking €30 billion-€50 billion for the endeavor over the next three years. But now, after the collapse of the government, Germany has no budget for the next year which could threaten the funding for some of the rail projects.

Christian Böttger, a professor at the Berlin University of Applied Sciences for Technology and Economics whose research areas include railroads, said he believed that DB would get the money one day, but only after a new government has been formed. "A cancellation by a new government seems politically very unlikely to me, but even the already imminent postponement of construction projects is, of course, a disaster," he told DW.

Back on track?

Bosselman is not too worried about deep cuts to railway funding in the future. He said politicians had realized that DB is part of Germany's "critical infrastructure." However, he believes that the current budget shortfalls will come at the expense of DB's reboot. "In Germany, roads have always taken precedence over rail, and that's why I feel that cuts to rail are more likely."

Bosselman intends to stay positive, as he believes that there's already "a lot of negativity going around" in German politics. "If you kind of give in to all that negativity, your life won't be too positive down the road," he said. "I can't see myself sad or disappointed in everything," he added. "There is always something to look up for."

So, instead of complaining about his employer, he aims to boost his career at the end of the year with a master's degree in railway operations, which, he said, could be a "door-opener to a leadership role" so that he can try to "transform Deutsche Bahn from the inside."

And some German passengers, though small in numbers, also have a reason for hope regarding improvements in rail services. DB announced a few weeks ago that the reconstruction of the Riedbahn would soon be completed, with service on the route scheduled to resume by mid-December — surprisingly for the rail operator, this would be right on schedule and just in time to complete the first project of the reconstruction plan ahead of the country's fresh elections.

This article was originally written in German.

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