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Comment by roboben | Hacker News Reader

The 9-Euro-Ticket is not usable for intercity connections, so I am not really getting the point how this is connected to DB is getting worse and worse. This is a development for the last 10-20 years. When you ride a train regularly, I did for a few years 3 times a week 3h Berlin/Leipzig, you see how broken the whole system is. I’d always say if you would run any other company with such a customer experience, you would be out of business in no time. I think the core problem is huge and extremely traditional management.

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There's maybe some connection: Due to the 9-Euro-Ticket there were (in my experience) often delays in regional trains (mostly due to trains being too full). Regional trains share the infrastructure with high-speed trains. So I would find it believable that they influence each other.

But yeah, it wasn't great beforehand, the trend was already there and it's not the 9-Euro-Tickets fault, IMO.

> I think the core problem is huge and extremely traditional management.

IMO a big part is also the neglected infrastructure. Many trains are new and old rolling stock is being upgraded, station buildings are being renovated, but the tracks and the signaling is often very old. There is just so much you can do when your (station) signaling still uses relays from the 60s.

> There is just so much you can do when your (station) signaling still uses relays from the 60s.

That's modern. About a quarter of the network still uses purely mechanical signalling and switch operations - that technology is literally and in every sense from the era of the German Kaiser Reich days.

True (and there is a nice video from Tom Scott[1] where he uses one of those things), but almost no high-speed trains[2] use those parts, AFAIK.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TLcaJdsRr0 [2] with the exception of a few "weird" Intercitys that take very strange routes to reach tourist destinations like Berchtesgaden

As one counterexample is enough to disprove your "[2]" :-) :

Until it'll be bypassed by the new Rastatt tunnel, there's at least one mechanical signal box left between Karlsruhe and Offenburg (Durmersheim) which sees regular and frequent intercity traffic. Until very recently there used to be another one immediately north of it (Forchheim) [1], but due to the construction works for the junction with the new high-speed line it was replaced with a new computer-based interlocking in 2018.

[1] And a mechanical block post in-between, but that one was more or less permanently switched out and was probably last used in 2009, when during construction works the parallel line via Ettlingen was closed,

Wow! I stand corrected :D

https://stellwerke.info/ has a good overview, and I think by now it's also quite comprehensive.

If you look at the map, filter for active signal boxes only and also remove "Elektrische Stellwerke" from the default filter, you might be able to discover whether the are any other mechanical or electro-mechanical signal boxes left on any of the main intercity routes.

(And since you mentioned Berchtesgaden: It looks like that whole line was switched to ESTW-operation (for non-Germans: computer-based interlockings) in November last year.

It's not connected at all, it's just a good scapegoat to hide the absolute mismanagement and corruption in the German government and state-owned private companies(boy do we love those)

>I think the core problem is huge and extremely traditional management.

Not saying that this is not a problem, but bulky management is a constant for DB, even during the years where it was considered world-class. I think it is the budget cuts and the resulting lack of infrastructure.

The connection is places like this: https://www.google.com/maps/place/48%C2%B009'08.6%22N+11%C2%...

What you see is a problem amplifier. Any problem related to any train, track or signal is amplified there and becomes a much bigger problem, for too many trains and people. Some of the tracks you see are high-speed tracks reserved for high-speed trains, but the problems spread to those too.

Is it possible to build such intersections better, so they don't amplify problems to such a degree? Absolutely.

Blaming "management" is a fine thing to do to do when you've no clue what's wrong or how it could be fixed, but you want to blame someone. Nice and generic.

Finally, they started working on it: https://www.sueddeutsche.de/muenchen/muenchen-pasing-bahnhof...

> when you've no clue what's wrong or how it could be fixed

I don't and no one else at DB has it apparently either, that's the real problem :)

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