The EU should make train travel in the European countries less expensive and more attractive. So instead of (climate) taxing flight tickets, (Netherlands) lower tax on train travel. Train travel is relatively clean. Travelling should be a EU citizen right despite income.

anarchisto on March 6th, 2019 at 08:19 UTC »

The EU needs more high-speed rail.

high-speed rail can replace in many cases planes; aviation uses 10 times more energy than high-speed rail, so it's going to be a huge reduction in energy usage. high-speed rail reduces the need for regular speed passenger rail, freeing the existing rails for freight. rail uses domestically-produced electricity, whereas planes and trucks use imported oil.

usuratica on March 6th, 2019 at 08:27 UTC »

Unfortunately there's a huge gap between West and East regarding train speeds and overall infrastructure.

In Romania the railroad infrastructure is atrocious, having actually decayed throughout the last decades. The average train speed is around 50 km/h.

One can only dream about TGVs.

Milleuros on March 6th, 2019 at 09:28 UTC »

I kind of agree, but note that plane tickets are absurdly cheap.

I was in Hamburg for a couple days this week-end. I went there by plane (Geneva-Hamburg), it was about $40. I came back by train (Hamburg-Basel), it was about $110.

$110 for a train travel through all of Germany is pretty cheap in my opinion, even more so considering the good comfort in their ICE trains. Yet it's still nearly thrice what I paid for plane. And if you think about it: $40 for taking the plane? Seriously? It doesn't make sense how cheap this is.

 

that being said, Swiss trains are expensive as hell in comparison to our neighbours. We could do some efforts there