The European Commission’s cross border pilot projects are a good idea – but not the way the Commission communicates it In January 2023 the European Commission announced its 10 cross border railway pilot projects. That the Commission would do this was a commitment in its 2021 action plan to boost […]
European Union
So party politics did not work. It’s time to solve Europe’s railway problems some other way
“Machen, was zählt” – “Do, what counts” That was the slogan of the party conference of the German Grüne this week in Karlsruhe, and I was running for a place on the party’s European Parliament election list. That effort failed completely yesterday evening when I tried to run for position […]
If you wanted a massive increase in night train routes in Europe, how could you do it?
In the draft European Parliament election programme of the German Grüne (full PDF here) you can find this paragraph about night trains (my translation): Night trains are a comfortable and climate-friendly way to travel long distances within Europe and thus a good alternative to flying. A massive expansion of night […]
How to actually build Europe-wide multimodal public transport booking platforms
On Page 29 of the draft European Parliament election programme of the German Grüne (full PDF in German here), you can find this text (my translation): What is taken for granted when booking flights should in future also be standard for all train journeys in Europe. With a cross-provider ticketing […]
Simple international trips, and the failures of ticket booking platforms
I am at World Passengers’ Festival in Vienna today, and four ticket vendors are here: Trip.com, Trainline, Rail Europe and All Aboard. So, I wondered, how do these platforms do with some pretty simple international journeys? And based on this research I am going to go to their stands here […]
We know what’s wrong with European railways. Mostly. But how do we fix it?
Another day, another depressing study. Greenpeace looked at rail and motorway investments across Europe, and found 66 % more budget spent to extend roads than to extend railways. Between 1995 and 2018 there was a 60% increase in the length of Europe’s motorways – more than 30,000 km – while […]