Faced with signalling problems, signal box failures, broken switches and safety-imposed speed limits, timetabling at Deutsche Bahn has descended into chaos. According to a new report by the advisory board, the German rail company has “lost control”. 

Timetables at Deutsche Bahn descend into chaos

The report by the Deutsche Bahn supervisory board, made available to the Süddeutsche Zeitung, paints a bleak picture of the state of rail travel in Germany. According to the report, passengers can no longer rely on trains running as advertised and are instead facing delay after cancellation after delay. Timetables are increasingly proving to be wishful thinking, rather than a reflection of reality.

The problem, according to the report, is that the German rail network has been neglected for decades, and the poor state of infrastructure is requiring numerous changes and workarounds to keep operations safe. With there being numerous defects in tracks, switches and bridges, trains are either being diverted or being hit with speed restrictions over affected sections. According to the supervisory board, speed restrictions are constantly being added “on a scale that has never been seen before.” 

All of this makes regular timetabling near impossible. This year alone, timetables have had to be changed between 2 and 3 million times, according to the Süddeutsche Zeitung. The advisory board report goes on to say that the planning of train journeys is increasingly becoming a lottery: “timetables are no longer calculated, but only estimated.” 

Deutsche Bahn forced to keep trains in reserve

This situation is only adding to Deutsche Bahn’s financial woes - earlier this year, the company posted record losses. The timetabling issues are forcing the company to keep more and more trains in reserve, often older models. These trains are used when scheduled trains reach their destination so late that the onward journey has to be cancelled. 

However, keeping so many trains and workers in reserve is prohibitively expensive, and according to the Süddeutsche Zeitung, not financially sustainable in the long run. 

10 years before German rail network is back in order

"Germany now has the oldest signal box landscape in Western Europe," Philipp Nagl, CEO at DB Netz AG, told the Süddeutsche Zeitung. "In recent decades, too little has been renewed, too little has been invested in renovation."

According to Nagl, 2024 is set to see the largest renovation work in decades, and will be the first year in which Deutsche Bahn is able to “stop the ageing of the infrastructure and initiate a turnaround.” 

However, passengers will have to exercise patience for a while yet: according to internal forecasts, it will be two years before we will see any significant improvements in punctuality, and Nagl estimates that it will take more than 10 years to get the transport network back in order. 

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