German Passenger Federation PRO BAHN Presents ALLRAIL with its Annual Award
The German Passenger Federation PRO BAHN has presented ALLRAIL Secretary General Nick Brooks with its Annual Passenger Award. This is due to ALLRAIL’s efforts to make the purchase of rail tickets in Europe as simple as possible for passengers.
GERMANY: Invest in the Infrastructure, not in a Company! The Planned Equity Increase for DB Risks Delaying Urgent Upgrades to the Network
Last week, the media reported about plans by the German government to increase the equity capital of the state-owned rail incumbent Deutsche Bahn (DB).
Not only would this distort competition - because equity injections into the DB Group parent company mean that its commercial subsidiaries can also benefit from support intended for its infrastructure subsidiary, but also, it comes at a time when the EU Commission’s competition authority is already investigating both DB and French incumbent SNCF for cross-subsidisation of their commercial freight operator subsidiaries.
Germany’s Federal Cartel Office Ruling that Deutsche Bahn’s Actions are Anti-Competitive Signals Major Rail Reform Will Come in Europe
- The EU Commission must act now to ensure this decision and behaviour change become standard practice across all EU markets
- ALLRAIL calls for the ruling to be immediately applied to all rail operators across Europe who use monopolistic behaviour
- Access to real-time data, open use of all relevant marketing techniques and keywords, and fair and non-discriminatory commercial terms for ticket vendors by dominant operators must become a European rail framework
- European consumers are one step closer to technology that creates a door-to-door travel possibility
‘Belgium’s approach to encouraging night trains should be emulated across Europe’
The Belgian measure in which night train operators will pay nothing for track access fees and energy over the next two years should be adopted across Europe, says ALLRAIL, which represents new entrants in passenger rail. The organisation celebrates the launch of European Sleeper last week, the “first ever – independently owned – scheduled long-distance rail operator to depart from Belgium”.
The First Ever Independent Scheduled Long-Distance Passenger Rail Service Departs from Belgium
A few days ago, history was made in Belgian passenger rail: European Sleeper was the first independently owned scheduled long-distance rail operator to depart from Belgium. Its new night train is commercially driven - not a Public Service Obligation (PSO) - and links Belgium, the Netherlands with Berlin in Germany.