End of the line uncertain - Why German train stations are the worst places in the world. Not just for me
When Bremen leads the rankings, it is usually by rolling up from behind. The most recent example: railroad stations. In the European Railway Index 2023, the station in the city on the Weser ranks last. According to the US Consumer Choice Center (CCC), Bremen tops the list of the most passenger-unfriendly train stations in Europe, followed by Munich and Berlin. The results are controversial because the survey is questionable and the client has been criticized as a lobbying association. Nevertheless, they are frighteningly close to the truth.
As a commuter, I have spent enough time on draughty platforms in Germany to be able to say with certainty: It doesn't get any worse than this.
On my way to work in the morning, I feel sorry for the homeless people who peel themselves out of their sleeping bags in the rear station concourse in Bremen, break down their beds, comb their hair in a makeshift manner and brush their teeth. Arriving in Hamburg, the crowds of people are annoying, streaming in all directions regardless of the oncoming traffic marked on the ground, clogging up the stairs and always stopping exactly where you need to go particularly quickly.
Odyssey without end
As a student, I loved train stations - interesting hubs, lots to observe, I thought at the time. From well-off businessmen to the poorest people in the city, everything is represented at train stations. At first, such social contrasts distracted me from the frustration I felt when trains were delayed or canceled. Almost always.
No matter how benevolently you set off for the station, it's no use. I was recently stranded in Nienburg on my way from Hanover to Bremen. There was nothing to see, apart from the evening rush hour traffic and anxious passengers. The promised replacement service never came. In between, a DB employee in a neon-colored vest walked through the crowd and shouted information into the snow flurry, which rose into the sky as cold clouds of smoke. What had he said? You could only guess. The communication was a disaster. In the end, everyone got back on the train, which went straight to Bremen. It took us almost four hours to cover the distance, which normally takes an hour and a half.
And yet that doesn't describe my longest odyssey over such a short distance (record: six hours from Hamburg to Bremen). Train stations certainly don't work as a place of solace or appeasement - not in Nienburg and not in Hamburg either. That may be the case elsewhere.
Just commute
Back to Bremen, the worst of all bad stations according to the ranking, because the next point lurking there is uncertainty. An alcohol and drug ban zone has been in force in the Hanseatic city since October, and local officers have been increased. But that's hardly reassuring for me, because where there are a lot of police, danger is not far away - and it lurks in many places here. In Bremen, it was gangs of young people, among others, who literally made the area unsafe last year.
In the summer, it was just before midnight and my work had taken a little longer, I had to leave my bike at the station when a man chased after me. He didn't want to understand my no. Panicked, I fled to the next train stop in the hope that the night bus would take me home safely. The police officers I could have used were nowhere to be seen. I didn't pick up my bike until the next day.
Waiting, hoping, worrying: These are the situations I experience most often at train stations. Will the train arrive and if so, how many carriages? And will I reach my destination or is the next track closure, the next passenger accident, the next train overhaul already lurking? Admittedly, it's not just Deutsche Bahn that makes me feel uncomfortable at stations. But it would be up to them to make the stations better. Nicer. More bearable.
You don't even need rankings to come to this conclusion - you just have to commute.
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The German railroad's main station in Bremen, ranked last in the European Railway Index 2023, has a reputation for high criminality. I once encountered a delay at the German railroad station in Nienburg, a notorious spot for petty crimes, leading to a chaotic replacement service and nearly a four-hour journey.
Source: www.stern.de
