The rail boss has ventured to Munich. He didn’t have concrete figures on the costs and construction time for the second S-Bahn trunk line with him, but the current forecast is probably not completely wrong. The mayor of Munich is annoyed by something else entirely.
Munich (dpa / lby) – After weeks of silence, Deutsche Bahn has now confirmed for the first time that the costs have exploded and that the construction of the second S-Bahn trunk line in Munich has been delayed for years. Although he is not yet in a position to make final cost and deadline statements, said rail boss Richard Lutz after a top meeting on Wednesday. “But we can certainly say that it will be more expensive and it will take longer.” At the beginning of October, Deutsche Bahn will then put the facts on the table.
The Bavarian Ministry of Transport is now assuming that the costs for the construction of the second S-Bahn tube across downtown Munich could increase from 3.85 billion to up to 7.2 billion euros. In addition, commissioning is likely to be delayed from 2028 to 2037. “We don’t have a completely different view of the world of numbers, neither in terms of dates nor costs,” confirmed Lutz after a conversation with Bavaria’s Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU), Munich’s Mayor Dieter Reiter (SPD) and district administrators from the Munich area orders of magnitude.
After presenting the facts, Söder also announced that the final decision on financing the additional costs would be made in the autumn, but “without any time pressure”. He again categorically rejected an end to the project, as this would mean losing three million euros without any equivalent value and, moreover, there was no idea for an alternative solution to the traffic problems in the state capital. There was no “whatever it takes”, a blank check, emphasized Söder. The task now is to optimize costs and accelerate processes.
In addition, it was agreed that other projects to improve local public transport in the metropolitan region would be brought forward, Söder reported. A three-digit million amount is planned for the S-Bahn network, Lutz added. In addition, Deutsche Bahn will report to the responsible committees every three months on the status of the main route.
Munich’s Lord Mayor Dieter Reiter (SPD) was only able to appease this a little. “Even today I was not allowed to find out any reasons why it suddenly took nine years longer,” he criticized the Deutsche Bahn communication. “You can only find solutions if you know the problem, but we don’t know it.” In addition, Reiter warned: “It is also clear that every further week without information about the further fate of the main route carries the risk that the political consensus on the subject of the main route and the U9 will crumble.”
A few hours earlier, a representative of the railways had spoken to the Munich City Council. The DB Group representative in Bavaria, Klaus-Dieter Josel, also referred to the beginning of October – which caused displeasure in the plenum. The city council was absolutely dissatisfied, said Reiter. Manfred Pretzl from the CSU called it completely unacceptable that the second main route could be delayed for so long. For the people of Munich and the many commuters from the surrounding area, the S-Bahn is the central means of transport, and many other projects also depend fundamentally on the new main line.
Lutz defended the course of action. When the project was decided on in 2019, it was only based on a feasibility study. Since then, the planning status has also been steadily deepened in terms of costs and time frames. Accuracy came before speed. “We then pushed things forward as quickly as possible and as well as possible,” said Lutz. In a few weeks you can now put reliable figures on the table.