The big reason why in this case the city of Berlin never added gates is a architectural reason. At least that’s what they claimed. Most U-Bahn stations don’t ha

The big reason why in this case the city of Berlin never added gates is a architectural reason. At least that’s what they claimed. Most U-Bahn stations don’t have a mid platform layer. They run directly under the road. You can’t create a universal system. If this argument is bullshit I’m not sure but it is what it is. But to the walking in part. You are only allowed on the platform with a valid ticket. Controllers can check for tickets outside of the trains but nobody normally does anyways. To the free public transportation part. Germany has a surge in this topic with the short introduction of the 9€ ticket. A ticket that costs 9€ a month and allows German wide travel (limited to specific trains). The politicians hit a political honeypot with this idea. A lot of Germans want the continuation of this ticket even though it is questionable that it actually pays out.