BERLIN — In an effort to address pollution by cutting car usage, Germany is considering making public transit free, starting with the cities with the worst pollution issues. The concept was included in a letter the German government sent to Eur...
http://trn.trains.com/news/news-wire/2018/02/15-germany-mulls-free-transit-to-fight-pollution
Brian Schmidt, Editor, Classic Trains magazine
I think it is a last, desperate attempt to avoid legal action by the EU. Loosing this law suit, which is likely, would cost Germany penalties of 400,000 EUR/day until the EU NOx limits are met.
And it is an attempt to avoid banning all but the newest diesel automobiles (Euro 6d) from the concerned cities. There are not too many Euro 6d diesels available.
Most of the transit systems are already at their limit. All would need to expand their system and fleets first to handle the expexted higher ridership. A town in the eastern Germany tried it years ago. The ridership went from 330,000 to 4,400,000. The experiment was cancelled after a few years because of costs.
It sounds great but I doubt that it will work.Regards, Volker (Essen, Germany)
Oh-oh, you mean German transit was not free before this proposal? Oops!
The five cities mentioned in the newswire rejected the idea of free transit as too expensive and not fundable today. Another reason is, it takes too long to reduce the NOx in the air to legal levels. The EU wide limits are from 2010 and the polititions dragged their feet and now it has become extremely urgent.
So this idea ended in the trash as could be expected.Regards, Volker
So what can be done? More specifically is there a real role for either transit or railroads in remediating the NO emissions to the required extent to lower the NOx to required levels 'net' of unavoidable photochemistry?
NOx is a city problem. About 40 cities definitely exceeded the EU limit for NOx. Approximately 30 more are bordering the limit.
Transit could help with taking individual diesel cars from the roads. But it wouldn't be enough and not fast enough. As said above the EU threatens with legal action.
On the other hand many wouldn't change over to transit as it might take an hour to work instead of 20 minutes by car.
50 per cent of th NOx is caused by diesel cars not diesel trucks. The trucks are a lot cleaner than the cars.
Our Federal Administrative Court is expected to publish a ruling if concerned cities are allowed to ban diesel cars other than EURO 6 from the city.
Among the EURO 5 cars are many with fraud software. The software was update but that lessens NOx by just 20% per car, not enough to solve the problems.
An unsaintly alliance between politicians and automobile industry prevented a hardware retrofit (SCR) at the cost of the industry which caused the problems.
The industry told it would be impossibe and too expensive to add a SCR catalyst. The German Automobile Club (ADAC) and aftermarket manufacturers showed that it is possible and costs about $1700 per car.
I think the retrofitting with SCR is the only viable way. It too isn't fast but it is effective. I think the EU would postpone the legal action realizing that there are promising efforts now after 9 years.
Diesel cars are promoted and subsidized in Germany as producing less greenhouse gases. Diesel cars make up approx. 30% of all cars and 40% of the yearly sales (2017) down from 50% because of the diesel scandal.Regards, Volker
The German Federal Administrative Courtruled today that the German states and municipalities can impose diesel car bans within the existing laws.
The bans are defined as a last resort. They are restricted to Euro 3 and 4 diesels at first. If these bans don't provide the necessary results Euro 5 diesels can be banned from September 2019.
I hope the propable bans get the goverment finally doing its job and pressures the automobile industry to pay for SCR retrofits. Euro 3+4+5 are approximately 13 Mio diesel cars and possible voters.Regards, Volker
What is Volkswagen AG in particular planning to do about this? I don't think there is enough shop labor or time to do all the necessary SCR installation/conversions even if the parts were immediately made available as kits. And that's a LOT of voters whose already expensively bought diesel cars will be banned no fault of theirs ... with a long waiting list, probably reduced performance, and all the ongoing DEF rigmarole in their future.
OvermodWhat is Volkswagen AG in particular planning to do about this?
If they get their will, nothing? The whole automobile industry refused to do more than software updates till now.
I think the verdict is necessary to wake up the government. The Secretary of the Environment commented this verdict already. She said that bans are not necessary immediately as their other ways like strengthening of transit and retrofits by the manufacturers would help.
On the other hand the city of Hamburg (which is a Federal state too) announced to close a number of highly polluted roads as soon as possible. That will be "fun" for those living along the detours and will most likely only shift the problems.
I agree that bans are unfair as all diesel car owner bought their cars faithfully. That will hopefulle increase the pressure on Government and industry.Regards, Volker
Would collector cars be affected? Mercedes has made diesels since the 1930s.
54light15 Would collector cars be affected? Mercedes has made diesels since the 1930s.
I don't know, but I'd kind of doubt it. How many vintage 1930's automobiles are still on the road to really make any viable difference?
Or 40's, 50's, 60's, 70's, or 80's cars, for that matter?
Exceptions are not defined yet. Crafts businesses mostly using diesel vans will be excepted as will be delivery traffic and other necessary traffic.
I doubt that collector cars will be allowed. First, most people owning a collectors use a standard cars for their daily chores. Second, the bans are for a number of city roads or single city quarters in 67 cities, not the whole country.
Firelock76Or 40's, 50's, 60's, 70's, or 80's cars, for that matter?
Bans are currently possible for diesel automobiles with Euro 4, 3, 2 exhaust classes, gasoline cars with Euro 2, and older. Starting in September 2019 diesel cars with Euro 5 can get banned too.
Since the verdict most politicians promise to do everything to avoid bans but they don't have a clue what to do. It was them who dragged their feet and ignored the NOx limits for almost ten years. There was a lot that could have been done over the years. But the EU legal action looming it has to go fast. An EU verdict can get very costly, $480,000/day until the limits met, 17.5 billion per year.
Better transit is a way to reduce individual car traffic but it needs advance time to build up capacity.Regards, Volker
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