Jon Worth

European, originally a Brit, became German, moved to France. Runs #CrossBorderRail project, writes a newsletter about railways. Green, lives happily without a car Normally stuck on a train, stuck in a village, or escaping either on a folding bicycle

Analysis

Tough times ahead for German rail supply industry? Procure some night trains!

International Railway Journal reports that the rail industry in Germany is facing tough times. So that makes now surely is an ideal time for new night train rolling stock to be procured! Photos used in this post Richard MatthewsBombardierJuly 7, 2011 License: Attribution 2.0 Generic (CC BY 2.0)

European Union

Bloomberg publishes new interactive website about night trains in Europe

Entitled "Europe Asks Travelers to Ditch Planes for Night Trains", Bloomberg has published a sort of interactive guide to night trains in Europe, and what the European Union is trying to do to solve the night train conundrum. It's not all quite right in the technical

Analysis

Germanwatch report on European trains travel

Berlin-based NGO Germanwatch has published a new report about train travel in Europe, in German - you can read the report here. The focus is heavily on what Germany should do, with an eye on the 26th September Bundestag election. The report has 6 key messages: 1. Develop a "

Analysis

If there's demand for a night train on a route, and a night train could be profitable, how can it be that no-one runs it?

One of the questions I am often asked when discussing rail travel in the European Union is why there is no night train on a given route. "People would take it!" I am told, and I do not doubt that. It is not the demand side that is

Analysis

The EU should place a blanket ban on trains being scrapped

This week we learned that part of Europe's night train renaissance is going to be built on... some couchette carriages that date from 1965. Yes you read that right - some 56 year old carriages are going to be deployed by ÖBB for its new Wien-Paris night train.

Analysis

Night trains are excellent, but marginal. How can their provision be scaled up in Europe?

Earlier this month European Sleeper announced its first route - Brussels-Amsterdam-Berlin-Prague - and the news was gushing. Euronews covered the story, saying how it was driven by flight shame, TimeOut talked of a "a ton of cool new sleeper trains", and Travel+Leisure talked about a "major

Analysis

Sage of the suburbs? When New York Times makes a kind of political GeoGuessr

A friend alerted me to this tweet earlier today, knowing full well a combination of political nerdiness and geographic geekery would appeal to me. And since then I have been playing the New York Times "Can you guess how these neighbourhoods voted?" game and wondering about... the political

Guides

Why you should buy a bike trailer for cargo

In 2009 I asked my parents to buy me a bicycle trailer as a birthday present. It was a Croozer Cargo, original 2003-2013 model (no longer manufactured, but you can find the manual for it as a PDF here), and cost £160 back then (about €200). Looking back little could

Guides

The weird and wonderful world of Eiffel Tower replicas and derivatives - Geoguessr

Work to update this post is ongoing. More than 470 Eiffel Towers are now mapped on umap here. The map is generated from a .ods Spreadsheet that you can find on Nextcloud here - if there are errors or omissions in either the map or the table please let me

Analysis

Long distance rail in Europe - an absence of a discernible strategy

Trains are a good thing. Capable of shipping huge quantities of people and freight over long distances and doing so without most of the downsides of road or air transport. Politicians of pretty much any political colour will be happy to say they are pro-rail. 2021 is even European Year

Analysis

Europatakt - a vision for EU-wide rail?

I have set foot in the Swiss town of Biel/Bienne more often than I care to remember, and for strictly 6 minutes each time. For that is where the Basel SBB-Lausanne InterCity train crosses the Zürich HB-Genève service, and as my trips are always Basel SBB - Genève, that&

Analysis

Tegel Airport - good riddance

It's finally happening. Almost 8 years late, Berlin Brandenburg Airport is at last opening this coming Saturday (31 October), and that means Tegel Airport will finally close by 8 November. That has prompted another round of outpourings of emotion about the old Tegel. So einen Flughafen wie Berlin-Tegel

Analysis

How could the EU solve the night train conundrum? Procure a massive fleet of night train carriages and lease them to operators

From the doldrums of a few years ago - when Deutsche Bahn left the business of running night trains completely - this mode of transport is back. Or at least in terms of public attention it's back. Snälltåget has bold plans for Sweden to Germany services in 2021,

Analysis

Why is the Berlin-Amsterdam train so slow? And why is it so hard to do anything about it?

This tweet and news story from The Netherlands caught my eye this morning - "Dutch Railways will make trains to Berlin and Brussels much faster: "We want to seduce air passengers"" the title says. Whether prioritising that route - to get people off planes - even

Analysis

Don't be distracted by ÖBB's shiny night train to Brussels - the problems of EU-wide rail run far deeper

Hey journalists! I'm glad to see you're writing about trains! ÖBB running its first NightJet to Brussels seems to have got you into a particular frenzy. It's amazing what a bit of red carpet at Gare du Midi, and Martin Selmayr on board, can

Guides

Turning a 2001 Riese und Müller Birdy into a modern folding bicycle

This post was written in January 2020, a smaller update was added in November 2021, and a large update was added in March 2022, with further small changes in April 2022 and January 2023. The original January 2020 blog post remains more or less as written! In the meantime if

Analysis

How to book Brussels-Amsterdam rail tickets - a further example of the absurdity of cross border rail in the EU

"Jon, did you know?" a friend asked me today. "There's now Eurostar Brussels to Amsterdam and it's cheaper than the Thalys!" As a rail nerd I did of course know it exists but I have not had the chance to take it

Analysis

How a little openness and transparency would change EU-wide rail

On Wednesday 15 January 2020, just under 2 months from now, I want to make a rail trip from Bruges in Belgium to Aix-en-Provence in France. What do I need to plan such a trip? The times of the trains, and an ability to book tickets. Shouldn't be

Analysis

The definitive guide to Berlin multi-mode mobility apps

For most of my adult life I have lived in big cities, and that means never having the need to own a car (even though I have a driving license). My own bicycle is my normal way around Berlin where I currently live, with public transport (U-Bahn and S-Bahn mostly)

Guides

A day trip to the last outpost of the Soviet Union - Tiraspol in Transnistria

So you want to go to the only place in the world that still has the hammer and sickle on its flag? A largely unrecognised state? One with a statue of Lenin in front of its Parliament? And you want to do that in 2019? And you want to do

European Union

A rail postcard from Passow (Uckermark)

Dear Violeta, It has been a little while since I last wrote you a postcard from one of my cross-border rail trips. But this week I took a little journey from Berlin to Szczecin / Stettin in West Pomerania in Poland, represented in the European Parliament by Bogusław Liberadzki - who

Analysis

SNCF. Is this public service?

My trip today, 10 April 2018: Toulouse (population: 467000, 1.3 million in the urban area) to Béziers (population: 75000). Distance 176km by train, 180km by road. Departure time: sometime around 1500. Towns along the route: Castelnaudary (population: 11000), Carcassonne (48000), Narbonne (53000). Beyond Béziers are Montpellier, Nîmes and Marseille.

Analysis

The enduring mess of cross-border rail booking - Geneva to Berlin

On Tuesday 28th November - more than 2 months from now - I want to make a train trip from Geneva to Berlin. The connection is easy enough - two InterCity trains in Switzerland, via Biel/Bienne, to Basel SBB, and then the NightJet night train from there to Berlin.

Analysis

Which Berlin eScooter sharing scheme should you join? Testing Coup and Emmy

tl;dr - join both Coup and Emmy If instead you want some detail, read on. Contents * Introduction * Prerequisites * Signup * Pricing * Scooters * Helmets * Test rides * Miscellaneous other remarks * Summary Introduction Berlin - long the testing groud for car sharing schemes - has a new mobility craze. The eScooter sharing scheme.

Analysis

Locomore lives again - with Czech partners and support from Flixbus

I started writing this blog enty sat aboard the first Locomore / Leo Express / Flixtrain / Flixbus service, departing at 1419 on 24th August from Berlin Lichtenberg to Stuttgart. I was only going as far as Berlin Hauptbahnhof, but that's enough time to test the onboard wifi. Solid so far