One of Germany’s main rail corridors is to be effectively closed for months as part of a major overhaul of the ailing train network of Europe’s largest economy that is expected to last until the end of the decade.
Years of underinvestment and lack of political direction are being blamed for the state of the German railways, which have in recent years been beset by a massive increase in breakdowns, delays, cancellations and other major technical mishaps and led to unflattering comparisons with infrastructure in the developing world.
Deutsche Bahn, the national railway company of Germany, a state-owned enterprise under the control of the German government, has also become the butt of international jokes at the Euro 2024 football championships.
Over the four-week tournament, football fans from England to Georgia discovered often to their surprise just how unreliable the trains were. “If it wasn’t already clear, the [experience during the] Euros showed just what a problem Deutsche Bahn has with reliability and punctuality,” wrote Die Zeit on Monday.
The phrase “made in Germany”, long considered an internationally recognised hallmark for quality, should be changed as a result of the myriad miserable experiences of fans, to “late in Germany”, one commentator quipped during the Euros due to the large numbers of fans arriving late to matches or not getting to them at all.
“When even the British, who are not exactly spoilt when it comes to the state of their railways … are complaining [about our trains], we know something is really wrong,” he added.
Deutsche Bahn issued a grovelling apology and a promise of financial compensation, though as many pointed out this may be cold comfort for foreign fans for whom the Euros come but every four years.
The overhaul will start with the 70km (43-mile) stretch between Frankfurt and Mannheim, a key national and international rail route on which one in seven long-distance trains – 300 a day, carrying 15,000 passengers – run and which is also vital for freight traffic.
Though Deutsche Bahn says some long distance trains will continue to run between Mannheim and Frankfurt, passengers reliant on it are being urged to use alternative routes, switch to replacement bus services, or use cars. Freight traffic is being forced to find alternative routes or turn to lorries. The stretch will be affected for five months, in which time Deutsche Bahn says it will replace tracks, points, sleepers, signal boxes, overhead wires and thousands of tons of gravel. The 20 railway stations along the route are also due to be modernised and noise barriers replaced or installed.
The necessary replacement parts have been under construction in factories across Germany, Europe and Asia for the past few months.
Affected routes include Berlin-Hamburg, Munich-Salzburg, Wiesbaden-Koblenz-Köln and Köln-Dortmund-Hamm.
Hamm has been nicknamed the most miserable rail stop in Germany due to the large number of incidents there in which the coupling and decoupling of train wagons has gone awry, leaving passengers stranded.
The entire Deutsche Bahn board, along with the transport minister, Volker Wissing, of the pro-business FDP, met on Monday in the picturesque town of Gernsheim for a celebratory opening of the construction site.
The first stage is one of a total of 40 stretches totalling 4,000km (2,500 miles) that Deutsche Bahn wants to renovate by 2030 at a current estimated cost of €40bn (£34bn) with the aim of transforming the railway into the efficient, fast-speed service for which it long held a solid reputation worldwide. However, funding for the remaining 39 corridors has only partly been secured, and Germany faces a federal election next autumn at the latest, raising questions about the plan.
Doubt has also been cast over its feasibility by the governing body of the German construction industry, which has said the schedules are unrealistic owing to the size and complexity of the project, as well as the lack of personnel.
Germans haunted by other recent major building projects of a less sprawling nature, such as Berlin airport, the Elbphilharmonie and the ongoing Stuttgart railway station, which have come in vastly overbudget and years over schedule, are also sceptical.
While welcoming the overhaul, environmentalists have bemoaned the lack of investment in a transport network on which climate protection is dependent, and voiced their fears that commitment to the reconstruction is half-hearted. The disruption to commuters and business could permanently turn users away from trains and on to the road, they argue.
The entire process, the biggest rail restoration project Germany has ever undertaken, according to Deutsche Bahn, is to be captured in a TV documentary series, which, it is hoped, will help ensure passengers stay onboard.
Wissing defended the restoration project, saying: “We’re no longer just patching things up, we’re completely renewing everything.”
• This article was amended on 17 July 2024 to clarify that Deutsche Bahn says that some long distance services will still run during the refurbishment of the Mannheim-Frankfurt line.
