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Comment by danwee | Hacker News Reader

For the ones who don't live in Germany: it's just for regional trains. So for instance if you would like to travel from Dusseldorf to Frankfurt (~200 km) people usually take ICE trains (direct, around 1h 45min. and 90 euros if you don't buy the ticket in advance).

On the other hand, if you are planning to use the 49 euro ticket... well, you either can't make it for the time slot you want, or you'll spend 4h-5h (best case scenario) with multiple changes in between. Also, regional trains are not like the ones one see in the movies: they are usually crowded, noisy, not that clean, and they are not always on time... which is rather critical if you are changing trains many times (ICE trains are more like the ones you see in the movies).

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None of this is true though?

Regional trains are as clean as any other trains. ICE really aren't that nice (and I find it hard to accept the price difference on that basis - the only reason why I'd ever take ICE is because I don't feel like taking 5 hours to travel from Cologne to Berlin).

They can be crowded around the times people are commuting, but otherwise they're not that crowded and it's easy to find a place to sit. If you're using the 49 Euro ticket to check out places nearby, there's no reason to believe you'll end up in a crowded train. Just make a tiny bit of effort not to take a train at peak times.

They're only particularly noisy if, I don't know, there's a big game locally and people are drinking on the trains. Even in a full train when everybody's going to or coming from work, people are really fucking quiet.

I'm not sure what your angle is, but I'm not sure why you're misrepresenting the state of German regional trains.

> Regional trains are as clean as any other trains. ICE really aren't that nice (and I find it hard to accept the price difference on that basis - the only reason why I'd ever take ICE is because I don't feel like taking 5 hours to travel from Cologne to Berlin).

I'm not saying regional ones are crap, just that in my experience ICE trains have been always cleaner than regional ones.

> They can be crowded around the times people are commuting, but otherwise they're not that crowded and it's easy to find a place to sit. If you're using the 49 Euro ticket to check out places nearby, there's no reason to believe you'll end up in a crowded train. Just make a tiny bit of effort not to take a train at peak times.

That's what I wanted to say. But again, compared to ICE, regional trains are "more" crowded (e.g., in peak times you see people standing and you can't barely move. I hardly see that on ICE)

> They're only particularly noisy if, I don't know, there's a big game locally and people are drinking on the trains. Even in a full train when everybody's going to or coming from work, people are really fucking quiet.

The more people, the more noise. Nothing particular about Germans/Germany. This is a human thing. So, taking into account the peak times, I think this is just pure common sense.

> I'm not sure what your angle is, but I'm not sure why you're misrepresenting the state of German regional trains.

My main point was that with the 49 euro ticket, one cannot travel as comfortably as one may think across Germany: mainly in terms of time.

> The more people, the more noise. Nothing particular about Germans/Germany. This is a human thing. So, taking into account the peak times, I think this is just pure common sense.

You'd think so, but they actually are really fucking quiet. Do I have to make a recording for you? People generally don't talk that much on trains, at least in Germany. Do you even live here? MOST people are on their phones, listening to music, just waiting for their next stop, or trying their best not to interact with anybody around them.

> My main point was that with the 49 euro ticket, one cannot travel as comfortably as one may think across Germany: mainly in terms of time.

If your point was about time, you would've said so and I would've agreed. Instead you went on an unnecessary and inaccurate rant because you seem to have a bug about regional trains that I don't get.

Regional trains are fairly comfortable much of the time, and the vast majority of the non-peak regional trains I take are great and the only complaints I would have are all the delays (due to flagging investment in rail infrastructure over the past 30 years), not the trains themselves. I'm not sure what else you want for 49 Euros per month for access to the entire country. Before, we got to pay 10, 20+ Euros per ticket. It's an amazing step of progress.

The experience can differ drastically between cities / regions. In Munich, most people are indeed silent except for Oktoberfest when all hell breaks loose at Hackerbrücke. In Berlin, most are also silent, but sometimes a dude with a trombone casually joins the train and starts blasting on a normal tuesday. :P

Some local networks have modern, nice trains. Others still operate designs that are from the late 60s and sound like a circular saw (e.g. the old S-Bahn trains or the Metro system in Munich). Some have nice seats and toilets in their S-Bahns, others have no toilets and super hard seats. Some have modern, high platforms with barrier-free access, others still use very low platforms and small diesel-powered carriages from the early 80s. Some operators clean the trash inside the train regularly during the day, others... don't. Some networks / lines are at (or even severely over) capacity, some are not.

There is no universal "german public transport experience", IMO. Maybe GP just lives in a region with old and neglected rolling stock. :)

Long-distance trains are (almost) all operated by DB Fernverkehr and thus there aren't such extreme differences.

> In Berlin, most are also silent, but sometimes a dude with a trombone casually joins the train and starts blasting on a normal tuesday. :P

Can confirm, buskers on my previous commute, somewhere on the Ringbahn near Landsberger Allee.

I've practically lived inside German trains, had my business meetings with more people inside them (there are wagons for that btw) and wouldn't define them as noisy.

When someone is rude, others will call them to attention. Big exception is bar wagon when there is some soccer match, nevertheless that is only on that part. Elsewhere you'd find silence being respected.

Trains can mostly be quiet even if sometimes there are people who are louder than usual. It happens sometimes. I wouldn't characterize regional trains as loud.

> People generally don't talk that much on trains, at least in Germany.

Go to München around Oktoberfest. (or other regional fair in Bavaria).

Expat in Germany since 2014, no car.

I can attest that I had a few trips where I could not sit anywhere for at least 75% of the trip.

Some were on RE ... but not all. It can happen also on ICE, albeit is less probable.

There is a trick. Travel with a metal/rugged luggage like Remowa and then you can sit on the luggage when that situation happens.

Who expected comfortable travel all over Germany for one month only paying 49 euros?

Our local public transportation communter card costs twice that lol

Your point about the ICE is quite valid. ICE is nice, but if I compare price and what I get for it between ICE 1st class and the green car on a Shinkansen, it's like night and day.

If you want the 49 Euro ticket experience for long distance / high speed trains, i.e. a ticket that allows you to use all trains, this will set you back 361.58 Euros / month for a "Bahncard 100", which really includes (AFAIK) everything now.

In comparision, in neighboring Austria, the same would only cost 91.25 Euros / month for the "Klimaticket Ö". Yes yes, Germanys rail network is bigger, still hurts a tiny bit. :')

I see it listed at EUR 402/month for 2nd class and EUR 682/month for 1st class or EUR 4,339 and EUR 7,356 annually. https://www.bahn.com/en/offers/bahncard/bahncard_100-conditi...

It's not cheap, but I have an acquaintance who got a Bahncard 100 with 1st class access because she works at the Bahn and it sounds quite life changing. ICEs on major routes are somewhat frequent and you can just get on the train without reservations or anything. Wanna go from Hamburg to Berlin for the day? You pretty much just walk to the train station and 2-2.5 hours later are in Berlin. You can do stuff on the train. Read a book, watch a movie, start work on your new startup's app or get a currywurst from the restaurant car. I am quite jealous of this.

It's slightly different, that was not a BahnCard 100. Those are only assigned to people outside Deutsche Bahn.

Deutsche Bahn employees can buy for 1 euro a 24 hours ticket to travel any train in German (ICE included) and bring someone else with them for free. That is the ticket for personal reasons.

If the travel is business related, then you always travel on first class to the destination. Among employees is very common/confortable to travel several times per week betwen locations.

Employees in high salary groups can opt to get a "NetzCard" which allows unlimited travel in all DB operated trains. High management gets a real BahnCard 100 for them and a second person.

The free day tickets for private use that every employee gets are limited to 16 a year (but only one a month is tax free) and don't allow to take someone with you.

By the way, not every employee can use first class for business related travel (many can).

DB are 100 sub-companies under the same brand. I'm getting the impression we are talking about different sub-companies with different rules.

AFAIK employees of high-enough rank do get a card that's equivalent to a BC100, or at least did at some point.

> I see it listed at EUR 402/month

Ah, true, I calculated with the (cheaper) yearly price. It is indeed more expensive if you don't pay the whole 4,339 Euros / year at once.

In theory yes. In practice not so much. There are very often delays for one reason or another. When it works it is indeed super. Usually it doesn't...

The monthly payment option is discontinued, you can now only get it by paying a lump sum of 4339 € for a whole year.

Your best case scenario is actually a worst case scenario.

From Düsseldorf to Frankfurt, using regional trains, you have to change once in Koblenz (RE 5 to RE 2). This is a connection which takes 3 hours and 50 minutes and runs every 2 hours (with numerous other options in between).

Also rather scenic if it takes the 'left side' between Cologne and Koblenz. Escpecially in the upper floor of the 'Dostos' (Double decked coaches). The Rhine, all the old castles, the wine grows on the steep hillsides, maybe some ships...

They are not always on time, but in my experience and from what I'm hearing, the long-distance trains (IC and ICE) have more and worse delays than the regional ones.

There is also cold hard statistics that prove your point:

https://www.deutschebahn.com/de/konzern/konzernprofil/zahlen...

IC and ICE ratio of being on time within 15 minutes of schedule: 82% in May 2023

RB/RE ratio of being on time within 15 minutes of schedule: 98% in May 2023

Or in other words, ICEs are late roughly 10 times as often as RB/REs are.

Wait folks do you really define "on time" as "within 15 minutes of schedule"??? You are guaranteed to miss all your connecting trains while officially being "on time"...

There is two categories on the page, one for 15 minutes, one for 5 minutes.

As for losing your connecting train, it's definitely a danger if you arrive with 15 minutes delay, yes. That's also why if you reclaim parts of your ticket price, they consider the whole journey and not just the delay of some individual train. So a 15 minutes delay can in the end mean you arrived 1:30 hour late.

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