Freie Wähler on transport

The Free Voters want to expand local public transit and cycling and settle how they are funded. The Deutschlandticket (nationwide transit pass) should stay, but municipalities should not have to cover its deficit. The party rejects bans on or subsidies for individual drive technologies.

The Free Voters want more buses, trains, and bike paths. The Deutschlandticket should continue. Cities and towns should not have to pay extra for it. Dogs should ride for free with the ticket.

According to the platform, the federal and state governments set the ticket price and leave municipalities alone with the funding gap. The connexity principle should therefore apply, meaning whoever orders a task pays for it. Taking dogs along for free should become part of the ticket. In transportation, the party considers it wrong to ban or specifically subsidize individual technologies.

The Free Voters reject the EU-wide phase-out of new combustion engine cars from 2035 and call for openness to all technologies instead. They fear that technology and production would otherwise leave Germany. They also oppose fines that carmakers would owe the EU for missing CO2 fleet targets.

From 2035, the EU wants no new cars with combustion engines to be sold. The Free Voters are against this. They say factories would move abroad. Carmakers should also not have to pay fines to the EU.

The platform argues that combustion engines will still matter worldwide for decades and that competition, especially from China, is growing. The auto industry should modernize, cut costs and retrain workers so they can find new jobs. The state is to support this shift, for example through technology funding. The party considers fines for missed CO2 fleet targets unjustified because customers prefer combustion cars to electric ones. It rejects one-sided support for any single drive technology.

The Free Voters want to fund research and development across all drive types, from e-fuels and hydrogen to electric mobility. Steering is to happen through a reliable price on greenhouse gases via certificate trading rather than through bans.

The Free Voters want to support all clean ways to power vehicles. These include electricity, hydrogen, gas and synthetic fuels. There should be no bans. Those who harm the climate should pay a price for it.

The platform lists e-fuels, biofuels, gas, hydrogen and electric mobility by wire or battery as possible building blocks, provided the fuel is produced sustainably. A long-term trading scheme for CO2-equivalent certificates is meant to trigger investment, including in aviation, for which no ban is planned. The party wants to back research into more sustainable storage and build up battery recycling. Safe techniques for emergency crews dealing with batteries are to be developed. Buses running on electricity, hydrogen or natural gas are seen as an important contribution in local transit.

The Free Voters want to use incentives and investment to move more freight from roads onto trains and ships. Freight routes are to be expanded and moved out of residential areas.

More goods should travel by train and ship instead of by truck. The Free Voters want to spend money on this. Freight trains should no longer run through neighborhoods. This applies above all to dangerous cargo.

Hazardous goods in particular should not roll through the middle of built-up residential areas. The platform accuses Germany of slowing the European freight corridor between Genoa and Rotterdam despite contractual commitments, and of burdening residents. For waterways, it calls for renovating and building new barrages and for hydrogen fueling infrastructure. Overall, investment in freight routes and waterways is to rise.

The Free Voters back fast rail links between major European cities, with frequent service and night trains as an alternative to flying. A European transit network is to allow cross-border tickets and subscriptions. Europe is also meant to take the lead in hyperloop technology.

Fast trains should connect the big cities in Europe. There should also be night trains. Then fewer people need to fly. One ticket should work in several countries. The party also wants to support a new, very fast technology called hyperloop.

The platform proposes a European network system that makes buying tickets across borders easier and permits subscriptions, called a “Bahncard Europa” (a Europe-wide rail discount card). Frequent service and night connections are meant to make rail competitive with air travel. Hyperloop is expected to allow travel at up to the speed of sound. Europe is to become both the main market and the main supplier of this technology.

The Free Voters want to make it easier to bring disused rail lines in rural regions back into service. According to the platform, this could reconnect more than three million people to the rail network.

Many old rail lines in the countryside are closed. The Free Voters want to open them again. Then more people have a train station nearby. There should be enough money for this.

The party says connecting rural areas to rail must not fail for lack of funding. It points to more than three million people who would regain access to the network through reactivations. The platform ties this to the Deutschlandticket (nationwide transit pass): whoever markets such an offer should also make the whole country reachable.

The Free Voters continue to oppose a toll on private car traffic in Germany. Their goal is toll-free private travel across all of Europe. To that end, roads important to the European network are to be funded jointly.

The Free Voters do not want a toll for private cars in Germany. A toll is a fee for driving on roads. Other European countries should not have one either. The countries of Europe should pay for important roads together.

The party recalls that it opposed a car toll from the start and wants to prevent a new attempt after the first one failed. In its view, introducing a toll in response to other countries' charges does not fit European cooperation. Instead, roads that matter for the European transport network are to become a shared responsibility.

The Free Voters want to end the privatization of transport infrastructure and treat it as a state task paid for by taxes. Existing roads, rail lines and above all crumbling bridges are to be repaired quickly, with more money and less red tape.

Roads, rail lines and bridges should belong to the state. The state should pay for them with taxes. Broken bridges should be repaired faster. There should be more money and less paperwork for this. The railway should get more staff.

Under the platform, decisions on building and upkeep should rest not only on cost-effectiveness but also on equal living conditions and on ecological and economic considerations. For rail, the party names an investment backlog and staff shortages as causes of cancellations and sees a confusing web of subcontractors as a result of privatization. Construction periods are to be fixed by contract, following the Dutch model. As in Switzerland, the cheapest bid should not automatically win tenders. Many bridges from the 1960s, especially on highways, are to be renovated faster and the bureaucratic hurdles reduced.