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DB is a gigantic organization. Do you think it is reasonable for them not not make progress or advancement in anything as long as the ICE delays are not fixed?

DB is a gigantic organization. Do you think it is reasonable for them not not make progress or advancement in anything as long as the ICE delays are not fixed? They can never change a train interior, improve the food menu, or 1000s of other things? This is a totally unreasonable suggestion. The reason for DB reliability problem is 50+ years of infrastructure neglect, fixing it will not be improved by shutting down every other group at DB. Personally having traveled threw Germany many times, its a mostly amazing. Yes sometimes trains are late sometimes, but the trains themselves are great and travel in them is a joy. I think what Germans don't understand is how good they have it compared to many places in the world.

tetris11 2y ago
But they had it better only a few years ago. DB has really crumbled.
probably_wrong 2y ago
Someone turned on the DB signal[1] so here I am. > sometimes trains are late sometimes, but the trains themselves are great and travel in them is a joy. "Sometimes"? Let me tell you about my friends in the German area of NRW. The one that commutes far away regularly gets stranded on the way because the trains arrive so late that there's no connection home till the next day and because, of the two lines that take her home, one is closed. The second one commutes within the city and has decided to buy a car because the SBahn was closed for over a year with a repair that took longer than planned. The other two don't even consider trains in their daily life. My GF at the time had a year-long line closure, we moved to a place with a year-long train closure and I'm living now in an area where my regular train won't run until November (assuming no delay). Yes, DB trains are pretty nice on the inside. Quiet, too. But what good is a nice train that doesn't take me to where I need to go, or at all? If anything, I think those that don't rely on the trains daily fail to realize how bad the situation is. Ten minutes delay on the one ICE trip on holidays? Sure, whatever, it's fine. Ten minutes delay on a five minutes connection to work? Enjoy wasting half an hour of your life every other day, like I did during my studies. Switzerland has cut DB off [2] and Scottish fans received warnings [3] about how unreliable German trains are. It is bad. [1] The DB signal is like the bat signal for comments downplaying DBs issues, but you often don't see it because there's a "Signalstörung" and it shows up an hour later. They usually apologize for the inconvenience. [2] https://www.iamexpat.de/expat-info/german-expat-news/deutsche-bahn-services-cut-swiss-rail-due-repeated-delays https://www.iamexpat.de/expat-info/german-expat-news/deutsch... [3] https://www.indonewyork.com/m/science/european-football-championship-dont-arrive-until-halftime-scottish-h111593.html https://www.indonewyork.com/m/science/european-football-cham...
- panick21_ 2y ago
  Look I understand all that. And Im all for fixing it. But its still objectivly better then in many other places. Rail overall in Germany is great. ICE are the weakness for sure. But its still much better then many other places in the world.
throwaway4good 2y ago
Under normal circumstances I would agree with you. But is DB and they really need to go all hands on deck and fix their reliability problem.
braza 2y ago
> I think what Germans don't understand is how good they have it compared to many places in the world. They should care about how other transportation systems are around the world as a coping mechanism? I mostly travel around DACH region + Nordics/Spain/Netherlands and sometimes the contrast in terms of reliability, maintenance, and integration makes me feel that Germany is 10+ years back in time.

tetris11 2y ago

But they had it better only a few years ago. DB has really crumbled.

probably_wrong 2y ago

Someone turned on the DB signal[1] so here I am. > sometimes trains are late sometimes, but the trains themselves are great and travel in them is a joy. "Sometimes"? Let me tell you about my friends in the German area of NRW. The one that commutes far away regularly gets stranded on the way because the trains arrive so late that there's no connection home till the next day and because, of the two lines that take her home, one is closed. The second one commutes within the city and has decided to buy a car because the SBahn was closed for over a year with a repair that took longer than planned. The other two don't even consider trains in their daily life. My GF at the time had a year-long line closure, we moved to a place with a year-long train closure and I'm living now in an area where my regular train won't run until November (assuming no delay). Yes, DB trains are pretty nice on the inside. Quiet, too. But what good is a nice train that doesn't take me to where I need to go, or at all? If anything, I think those that don't rely on the trains daily fail to realize how bad the situation is. Ten minutes delay on the one ICE trip on holidays? Sure, whatever, it's fine. Ten minutes delay on a five minutes connection to work? Enjoy wasting half an hour of your life every other day, like I did during my studies. Switzerland has cut DB off [2] and Scottish fans received warnings [3] about how unreliable German trains are. It is bad. [1] The DB signal is like the bat signal for comments downplaying DBs issues, but you often don't see it because there's a "Signalstörung" and it shows up an hour later. They usually apologize for the inconvenience. [2] https://www.iamexpat.de/expat-info/german-expat-news/deutsche-bahn-services-cut-swiss-rail-due-repeated-delays https://www.iamexpat.de/expat-info/german-expat-news/deutsch... [3] https://www.indonewyork.com/m/science/european-football-championship-dont-arrive-until-halftime-scottish-h111593.html https://www.indonewyork.com/m/science/european-football-cham...

panick21_ 2y ago
Look I understand all that. And Im all for fixing it. But its still objectivly better then in many other places. Rail overall in Germany is great. ICE are the weakness for sure. But its still much better then many other places in the world.

throwaway4good 2y ago

Under normal circumstances I would agree with you. But is DB and they really need to go all hands on deck and fix their reliability problem.

braza 2y ago

> I think what Germans don't understand is how good they have it compared to many places in the world. They should care about how other transportation systems are around the world as a coping mechanism? I mostly travel around DACH region + Nordics/Spain/Netherlands and sometimes the contrast in terms of reliability, maintenance, and integration makes me feel that Germany is 10+ years back in time.