Tuesday

28th Nov 2023

Most EU public transport too expensive, Greenpeace finds

  • A tram in Berlin. Cheap €49 tickets in Germany for all trams, metro, buses and regional trains have been immensely popular (Photo: Fionn Große)
Listen to article

New analysis by Greenpeace has ranked the affordability of public transport in 30 European countries, concluding that in most places prices are too high.

Apart from Luxembourg and Malta, which have made domestic public transport free, only Austria, Germany and Hungary have introduced relatively affordable nationwide tickets, costing less than €3 per day, according to the data published on Thursday (4 May).

Read and decide

Join EUobserver today

Become an expert on Europe

Get instant access to all articles — and 20 years of archives. 14-day free trial.

... or subscribe as a group

Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece and Norway scored worst in the ranking, while Dublin, London, Paris and Amsterdam ranked worst in the list of capitals, offering tickets above €2.25 per day. In Amsterdam, for example, the price of a yearly ticket is €1,001.

Around two-thirds of the countries analysed do not have countrywide long-term travel passes at all. The report also takes aim at taxes on public transport, which are on average 11 percent VAT, which the researchers write is "higher than many basic services."

Six EU countries, including Romania, Bulgaria, Estonia, Slovakia, Croatia, and Hungary tax public transport at the top rate, with Hungary leading the pack at 27 percent.

"Affordable public transport is a necessity, but many governments treat it like a luxury good," said Greenpeace EU transport campaigner Lorelei Limousin.

She points out that cross-border airline tickets are excluded from VAT and the kerosene is also tax-free. Scrapping VAT on bus and train tickets is an easy way to get people to drive less, the report concludes, but Limousin said more needs to be done.

The analysis comes days after Germany and Hungary's new low-cost nationwide travel cards came into effect on 1 May. The so-called the Deutschlandticket offers travellers a monthly €49 ticket for local and regional public transport. According to the German transit authority, one billion trips per month are made under the scheme, and one in five buyers is a new traveller who usually does not use public transport.

Although these are rough estimates, market research has shown about half of the population made use of the cheaper tickets.

German transport minister Volker Wissing last month expressed support for a similar low-cost pan-European public transport ticket—a proposition Greenpeace supports and the group has called on the European Commission to facilitate the introduction of a Europe-wide single climate ticket in the future.

"Governments must introduce simple and affordable 'climate tickets' for public transport, to cut people's bills and to reduce the oil use driving our planet towards climate disaster," said Limousin and suggests these services could be paid by taxing polluting forms of travel and end tax exemptions for international flights and for aviation fuel.

MEPs give green light to road transport sector reform

MEPs adopted on Thursday the Mobility Package covering truck drivers' working conditions - rejecting amendments pushed by central and eastern member states. However, the European Commission warned that two new rules might be not align with the Green Deal.

Opinion

Weaponising transport in the Spain vs Catalonia saga

A canned €1.7bn Barcelona airport project did not come as a surprise to many Spaniards and most Catalans. Transport infrastructure in Spain is governed with an underlying mandate of protecting Madrid as the central node of political power.

Opinion

The geopolitics of a post-growth EU

An EU that renounces the economic growth dogma could more easily reduce its dependence on energy and materials from Russia and China, thus gaining resilience. Reducing its security dependence on the US, however, is a tougher nut to crack.

Opinion

Will EU climate chief Hoekstra come clean before COP28?

As the new EU climate commissioner, Wopke Hoekstra, heads to COP28, three senior MEPs question his ties to the fossil-fuel industry — and call for him to disclose all his ties while working for 11 years for McKinsey.

Latest News

  1. EU belittles Russia's Lavrov on way to Skopje talks
  2. Member states stall on EU ban on forced-labour products
  3. EU calls for increased fuel supplies into Gaza
  4. People-smuggling profits at historic high, EU concedes
  5. EU bets big on fossil hydrogen and carbon storage
  6. How centre-right conservatives capitulate to the far-right
  7. My experience trying to negotiate with Uber
  8. Key battlegrounds in EU's new media legislation

Stakeholders' Highlights

  1. Friedrich Naumann FoundationPoems of Liberty – Call for Submission “Human Rights in Inhume War”: 250€ honorary fee for selected poems
  2. World BankWorld Bank report: How to create a future where the rewards of technology benefit all levels of society?
  3. Georgia Ministry of Foreign AffairsThis autumn Europalia arts festival is all about GEORGIA!
  4. UNOPSFostering health system resilience in fragile and conflict-affected countries
  5. European Citizen's InitiativeThe European Commission launches the ‘ImagineEU’ competition for secondary school students in the EU.
  6. Nordic Council of MinistersThe Nordic Region is stepping up its efforts to reduce food waste

Join EUobserver

Support quality EU news

Join us