State, districts and cities: improve local transport services

Passenger numbers - State, districts and cities: Improve local transport services

The state, districts and local authorities want to significantly improve public transport services in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. As part of a mobility offensive presented on Monday, regional bus routes and a state-wide on-demand bus system with uniform standards are to be introduced. The network of bus routes in the region is to be improved and made more user-friendly through coordinated timetables.

"Only with an attractive range of local public transport services can we succeed in persuading more people to switch from car to bus or train," said State Secretary for Economic Affairs Ines Jesse in Schwerin. She had previously signed a "Joint declaration on improving public mobility services in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern" with representatives of the districts and independent cities.

According to Jesse, the regional bus routes will run regularly every hour or every two hours in future, regardless of school and vacation times. Links with rail services are to be noticeably improved. Until now, there have often been waiting times due to inadequate coordination, and some places are difficult to reach during the vacations when there is no school transport.

According to Jesse, the state provides permanent subsidies to finance the regional and on-call bus system. In return, the local authorities have undertaken to provide cross-district services and guarantee reliable bus service intervals. The first three Regiobus routes started operating with the timetable change on December 10, with more to follow.

"The districts have also committed to the rapid implementation of the respective municipal on-call bus systems across the board," emphasized Jesse. By the end of 2024, a nationwide regular service should be in place. The aim is to create a state-wide fare network, for which the basis has already been laid with the introduction of the Deutschlandticket.

The Managing Director of the Association of Districts, Matthias Köpp, pointed out that the association of local authorities had already campaigned in 2018 for rural areas to be better connected to the existing infrastructure by public transport. Even back then, a demand-oriented on-demand bus system for the entire country and a coordinated timetable for the routes had been under discussion. Now the necessary funds have finally been included in the state budget. According to Köpp, there will be 13 million euros per year for the on-call bus system until 2026.

Following the drastic slump in passenger numbers during the coronavirus pandemic, significantly more people in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern used buses and trains again in 2022. According to surveys by the Statistical Office, around 128 million passengers used local public transport services in the previous year. This was a third more than in 2021 and also slightly more than in the pre-corona year of 2019, when 126 million passengers were registered on local public transport throughout the state.

In the meantime, passenger numbers had fallen below 100 million per year. This was due to school closures, increased working from home and restrictions in tourism. Local transport experienced a further upswing in 2023 thanks to the Deutschlandticket. Figures for the current year are not yet available.

In 2022, buses and coaches were once again the main means of public transport with 73 million passengers. According to the statistics, the streetcars operating in Rostock and Schwerin carried 39 million passengers, while regional trains and suburban trains carried 22 million passengers. If several means of transport were used during one journey, multiple counts were made. Railroads recorded the largest increase compared to the previous year, with a rise of 56 percent.

According to the statistics office, the results are based on data from the annual statistics on local rail passenger transport and commercial bus transport. A total of 58 companies in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern were included.

Local transport report with tables