The 9-euro ticket has been well received in the southwest. The offer will not be continued beyond August. The transport associations are demanding reliable financing for local transport.
Stuttgart (dpa / lsw) – A few days before the 9-euro ticket expired, numerous transport associations in the south-west reported brisk demand for the ticket. At the same time, they are counting on one or the other user switching to bus and train. A spokesman for the Bodensee-Oberschwaben-Verkehrsverbund said: “Of course we also hope that the 9-euro ticket will bring us some new permanent public transport users.” Whether there will be a follow-up offer is currently being discussed.
A spokesman for the Stuttgart Transport and Tariff Association (VVS) said that the successor plan had to be properly calculated and that sufficient time had to be allowed for the sales implementation. At the same time, it must be permanently funded by the federal government. According to an initial estimate, 1.8 million 9-euro tickets were sold at the VVS. In addition, more than 350,000 subscriptions were switched every month, according to a spokesman. A total of around 3 million tickets were issued.
The light rail, S-Bahn and buses were fuller than usual, but still had sufficient capacity. According to the spokesman, local public transport is generally used less in summer than in winter. In contrast, many regional trains were heavily occupied and sometimes overcrowded. Trains to Lake Constance, Nuremberg or Karlsruhe were given as examples.
According to an estimate, the regional transport association Freiburg will have sold more than 500,000 of the cheap tickets. The numbers of Deutsche Bahn are not included. After the end of the discounted offer, it is assumed that the occupancy rate will level off at a level similar to that before the ticket, a spokesman said.
The Verkehrsverbund Rhein-Neckar (VRN) announced that the first results in June indicated that around 20 percent of previous public transport non-users had bought the ticket. “The decisive factor will be how many of the new 9-euro ticket users will continue to use local public transport after the campaign period and switch to the already existing and inexpensive tariff offers of the association.”
According to the Karlsruher Verkehrsverbund (KVV), there was also strong demand for the ticket. “The 9-euro ticket was a success because it stimulated the discussion about the role of public transport financing.”
