Spain is ramping up to follow Germany’s Deutschland Ticket, which gives nationwide public transit access for a flat rate.
I love our Deutschland Tickets. The subscription system is wonky, but once you have it running it’s wonderful.
Nice work, Spain!
wait wait wait, why does germany get the praise when the Generalabonnament (GA) has been a thing in switzerland since *opens Ecosia* 1898?!?!
Our GA is older than germany?!?!
TIL:
I didn’t know about the GA in Switzerland. That’s great to hear.
Of course, then I look at the price. It’s CHF 355, which is about 379 Euro/month. That’s crazy high compared to these other programs. It might get access to better trains, such as the HSR system that the D-Ticket doesn’t, but most people don’t need those on a monthly basis.
Points for a unified system, negative points for being crazy expensive, unless I’m missing something, of course.
The great thing about the GA that it truly is a “Generalabonnament”. It includes practically every form of transport in the country. Every train, every bus, the ships, most of the gondolas and even many of the more touristey connections. It’s so comfortable to know you can just go to the trainstation, take any train to any city, get there and then take any bus (or tram or subway or ship or whatever) once you arrive at your destination without ever having to worry about or buy a ticket.
Also the price varies a lot. For example, in a family GA a child will only pay 60.- CHF per month (yearly GA) which makes it a lot more attractive again. And similarly for your Partner a GA Duo will only cost 240.- if you already have one.
Nitpick, oder than the federal republic of Germany yes, older than the German Empire founded in 1870, no