Remind me, why are we trying to fix rail ticketing in the EU?
In the Newsletter this week
Analysis: Remind me, why are we trying to fix rail ticketing in the EU?
Bullshit Meter: Zagreb-Sarajevo trains to re-start
Good week: European Sleeper launches its new Paris-Berlin night train
Confusion this week: A timetable for Wien - Budapest - Beograd trains, but no start date
Bad week: PKP IC finds itself in hot water regarding scrapping trains
Very bad week: Beavers and bison cause problems in Poland
Photo of the week: Locomore launch
Calendar: European Passengers Federation Annual Conference 5-6 June in Maastricht
Newsletter 010, Friday 27th March 2026.
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Remind me, why are we trying to fix rail ticketing in the EU?
"Can you recommend a site where I can book the train tickets for my summer holiday?" is a sort of question I get from friends offline, and from people who follow me on social media.
And unfortunately the response is another question: "Can you tell me roughly where you want to go? Then I can recommend you something."
Because we do not have any site or platform that can sell me train tickets anywhere in the EU.
Sure, some sites work in some places. Interrail is a solution if you want to make a bunch of trips. But if you want a one off single trip from Vilnius to Tallinn, I am going to have to recommend you a different site to book it than a single between Barcelona and Nice.
If I wanted a flight between these places I'd have half a dozen options that work well enough for both routes. In rail I do not.
The need to solve this problem was stated in Ursula von der Leyen's Political Guidelines for the European Commission 18.07.2024 (PDF here):
"Cross-border train travel is still too difficult for many citizens. People should be able to use open booking systems to purchase trans-European journeys with several providers, without losing their right to reimbursement or compensatory travel. To this end we will propose a Single Digital Booking and Ticketing Regulation, to ensure that Europeans can buy one single ticket on one single platform and get passengers’ rights for their whole trip."
That Single Digital Booking and Ticketing Regulation (SDBTR) is due to be proposed by the European Commission this spring (I have heard various dates in late May suggested as the day it will come out).
I have some issues with the precise phrasing of von der Leyen's text, but the gist is fine. We want to make cross-border train travel easier (hell, this is the EU, so logically it has to focus on the cross border - we are not trying to fix purely national problems here!), this has to work even if there are several different train companies involved, and passenger rights need to be protected.
So what the Commission comes out with has to be judged on that. That is why we are trying to fix rail ticketing in the EU.
In the coming months as this issue develops I will return to the topic in this newsletter, explaining also how different aspects of the reform will work. I have also written a number of further pieces about some of the likely aspects of SDBTR - for more background those might be worth your time. Those are:
- How to fix railway ticketing in the EU (an overview of the core issues that need solving)
- One ticket or more than one ticket (von der Leyen states "one single ticket" but it might be easier to have more than one ticket - this piece explains why)
- Who is going to benefit from this (an explanation of how you do it all in a way that benefits occasional travellers, regular travellers, and in a way that does not place extra burdens on rail companies)
- Booking horizons for rail tickets (why a unified booking horizon would be nice, but given I cannot see this happening, here is what to do instead)
- Do railway companies need to know my whole travel chain (I am not convinced a railway company needs to know everything about earlier legs of my journey)
- Why we need new law here (an older piece explaining why if we just leave railway companies to it, they will not solve these problems themselves)
And all the pieces I have written about ticketing are here.
Bullshit Meter: Zagreb-Sarajevo trains to re-start
A bunch of people sent me this story - that trains between the capitals of Croatia and Bosnia will re-start.
Unlike many of the stories I have assessed in the Bullshit Meter, this one is actually viable:
The problems are more financial (I am pretty sure tickets are not going to cover the cost of running it) and political (this is the route - this train would have to cross not only from Croatia into Republika Srpska, but also from Republika Srpska into the Bosnian Federation - no passenger trains cross that "border" currently!)
I'd really like this to happen, but I am not holding my breath!
All previous Bullshit Meter posts can be found here.
Good week: European Sleeper launches its new Paris-Berlin night train
What ÖBB and SNCF decided they could not do without a public subsidy, private startup European Sleeper reckons it can do - run a Paris-Berlin night train. The first train on the new route, running via Bruxelles to Berlin, departed Paris Nord on Thursday this week, and the service will run 3 nights a week in each direction. Excellent work Elmer, Chris and the team, and the other companies involved making it happen - Train Charter Services, Wagon Plastron and RDC.
Yes, the carriages are old. Yes, the route is a bit longer than slower than it would ideally be (but that can be improved). Yes, we need even more of this. But immense credit to European Sleeper - they get things done!
Confusion this week: A timetable for Wien - Budapest - Beograd trains, but no start date
I was alerted to the existence of this timetable in this Bluesky post. You can find the full resolution image here. So we now likely know the timetables for Wien - Budapest - Beograd trains, but we still do not know when they will start - as the line has not been cleared to be opened for passenger traffic.
With the election in Hungary on 12th April, time is short for Orbán to try to get it open for the photo op before the vote!
Bad week: PKP IC finds itself in hot water regarding scrapping trains
When the European Commission released its High Speed Rail Action Plan in the autumn, it contained this passage:
"Legislation will support the development of a second-hand market for rolling stock. The Commission will propose, in 2027, measures to ban anticompetitive scrapping of functioning and safe rolling stock, and to establish transparent conditions for its resale and operation across all Member States."
It's nice to see a 2021 idea of mine reach such high places! I say that semi jokingly, but I do think I was the first person to publicly advocate the EU needed to act on this.
Now there is an interesting case in Poland concerning the scrapping of locomotives. OK, the 160km/h EP09 series are not exactly high speed, but as reported by Rynek Kolejowy, two locomotives were simply assigned as being of value only as scrap - rather than presumably trying to resell them, and for a higher price. Irregularities were found in the internal process.
Whether anyone would have wanted two 1980s-era passenger locomotives is not really the issue. The point is whether someone else could even have tried, and it looks like PKP IC prevented that happening here.
Very bad week: Beavers and bison cause problems in Poland
Two unrelated stories regarding animals and railways in Poland. First beavers destroyed part of the Starachowice narrow-gauge railway, forcing the suspension of services. And then a PKP IC train collided with three bison, killing these rare animals. Not a good week all round!
Photo of the week: Locomore launch
Going to the launch of European Sleeper this week reminds me of a different train launch I attended - 24th August 2017 in Berlin, pictured here. This was a daytime train using renovated InterRegio carriages, and while Locomore is no more this was the predecessor of Flixtrain. You can do a lot in a decade, as this proves!
Calendar: European Passengers Federation Annual Conference 5-6 June in Maastricht
5-6 June in Maastricht, European Passengers' Federation is holding their annual conference, and I will be there to speak about #CrossBorderRail and the forthcoming reform of EU rail ticketing. All the details of the event are on this dedicated website, and you can register there too!
It's even a chance to experience the saga of the Drielandentrein first hand while trying to get there!
If you would like to stay up to date with what I am doing, there are public calendars to which you can subscribe: Jon Worth - Speeches and Events ICS | Jon Worth - Travel ICS | Jon Worth - Other Rail Dates ICS And if you'd like me to speak at an event or run a workshop, contact me about that.
Photo Rights
All photos in this edition are taken by Jon Worth, except the EP09 image - that is PKP Intercity - lokomotywa EP09 015 z pociągiem EC Varsovia (05.10.2014) - Dariusz Sieczkowski, October 5, 2014, CC BY-ND 2.0. Bullshit Meter images always have photo rights listed directly on the image.