Warum das Auto im Eisenbahnland Schweiz immer noch die Oberhand hat

https://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/swiss-politics/why-cars-still-reign-supreme-in-rail-nation-switzerland/87990585?utm_source=multiple&utm_medium=website&utm_campaign=bundle-front1_en&utm_content=o&utm_term=wpblock_teaser-bundle

Von Realistic-Lie-8031

34 Comments

  1. InitialAgreeable on

    Oh boy, this comment section is going to be a battleground.

    I’ll break the ice: in my opinion, train fares are too expensive, whereas the road network is underdeveloped.

    Roast me 😁

  2. Collapse_is_underway on

    Because we don’t care about the various ways of cars to pollute our environnement (so, our country).

    We only tunnel-vision on carbon emission when the tires are also part of the pollution disaster of micro and nanoplastics being everywhere.

    Let’s keep ignoring that we’re poisoning ourselves at an increasing speed. I mean, having ALWAYS MORE of everything in every area is obviously our common goal. And while we’re at it, let’s keep on deluding ourselves that it’s physically doable, because some trash-tiers economists says so.

    And lastly, let’s not prepare to handle a world with increasingly huge shocks, may them be from ecology, economic or geopolitics factors. Food will always and forever come from our retailers and we should keep on destroying our fertile soil with monoculture, because… IT’S CHEAP !

    PS : Bonus point for the big project of roads coming up, because we can so obviously see that doubling the lanes worked so very well in huge cities that applied this “”””logic”””” (like, Las Vegas).

    Don’t forget to listen to economiesuisse or similar lobby trashes that will come up with degenerate and unrealistic arguments, to make sure that next years, they’ll be able to buy their third house.

  3. paprycjusz on

    Because trains are so f-ing expensive.

    Example: a typical couple from Zurich wants to escape fog and misery and go for a day to sunny Lugano. Train tickets cost 136 CHF both ways with halbtax. At the same time journey by car cost 50 CHF in fuel + 10 CHF in parking. Difference is even bigger for families with kids.

    So maybe instead of pouring billions on new asphalt we’d make trains actually affordable?

  4. FifaPointsMan on

    Never will understand how people would rather sit in a traffic jam than go with the train.

  5. City to City or village to City and vice versa public transport is great. But village to village not so great(which is totally logic because that specific combination is probably rarely used). And lots of Swiss live in rural areas.

  6. darkgreenrabbit on

    Taking public transport to work would take me 48 minutes – if I drive, it’s 13 minutes on average. Now add the fact, that being 1 minute late for my bus, would make me arrive at work 30 minutes later – the same scenario sets me back 1 minute when going by car. Flexibility is by far the biggest factor for me when it comes to this topic, and every single person I know says the same thing – I am not willing to give up comfort, flexibility and 1h of my life every single day for a cause that won’t be single-handedly affected by me.

    + like everyone said, public transport is too expensive, especially if you are traveling w others

  7. ErikHalfABee on

    One of the most important questions we should be asking is why do we need cars?

    Break down the reasons for cars, and see if there could be good non car solutions for each reason.

    By making it more convenient to not use the car, traffic can be reduced.

    For example: my wife uses the car to go shopping and carry her stuff back home. She doesn’t want to / can’t carry the stuff home on the bus. So what about a better personal goods transport & delivery infrastructure?

  8. I am 100% convinced that people that come on here to just rant on cars must live in super well connected areas with a one-stop or no-stop destination for work and leisure.

    The working hours must be super standardised and never deviate into very early or very late AND they must get their GA compensated either by being young or having the workplace pitch in.

    Little cherry for those that of course have a 1.Class GA and therefore can always sit.

    I’m glad that’s the demographic of most of the country and the ones using a car are just simply lazy, self centred, hate the environment and love to sit in traffic listening to the same 10 songs every day on the radio.

  9. BladedTomato on

    Trains don’t drop me off at my door at the time I want with the people I want and the stuff I carry and or want to leave in my car. Trains do have timetables and arrive in train stations and you have to travel with the rest of the passengers.

    What’s so hard to understand the car is a much more private and flexible experience, regardless of the premium and hidden costs.

  10. I don’t understand why there’s not more people on motorbikes or 125cc rollers.

    Most of the year, the weather is good enough. Most commuters are sitting alone in their car, using too much space and gasoline. A roller is way more efficient!

    For the price of 2 years of GA you can buy a new roller and plenty of gas and insurance isn’t that expensive

    [Edit]
    Ps
    I would love to have a GA. But for my daily commute, it doesn’t make sense, and 4k a year is a lot to me. I love my halbtax. Because then the trainticket prices feel like “normal” to me. It would be nice if there was something between a halbtax and a GA so train travel would be more affordable.

  11. Peace_and_Joy on

    Typically these arguments are done over dinner in trendy kreis 4 where a bunch of overpaid hipsters tut loudly at people using cars..

    Outside of this overloud crowd is the reality of hugely expensive public transport, difficulties of families having to organise and carry stuff, weekly shops, sheer convenience of final mile transport options, winter travel, shorter commute times if you don’t live directly on a train. Let alone the fact that some people like to travel to different countries or just like driving!

  12. Dolphins_are_rapist on

    First; convenience.
    Our time on this planet is limited, we spend enough of it working and sleeping. If I can save myself 1h a day of liberty, for a similar or marginally higher cost, I will do it.
    Connexion are far from good unless you live in a large city or urban area. I am a 5 min drive from the city, only 2 bus in the morning, 1 at noon, 4 in the evening. God forbid you miss it because the driver did not keep the schedule or the bus was full when it passed you.
    Sure I can walk but then it is 45 min transit to my work instead of 7.

    Second; price.
    Certainly if you do not own a car, AG is cheaper if you are alone or two.
    Once you are a family of 4, the price average out.
    So for the same price you get the convenience.
    Also, even if you are a family of one child, you must really hate car if you are willing to submit to the nightmarish logistics of travelling with a stroller on a bus. Not all kids like to be carried on the back.

    Thrid; environment.
    Unlike what extremist like to say, most people are willing to do their part.
    But we have to be realistic on what we ask them to do. In Switzerland people sort their trash rather well, recycle, buy local when they can afford to, do not overheat or use ac recklessly. If they can, most will drive electric.
    But of course, when they can, they will travel by plane because it is either cheaper or faster than other ways. People want to strike a balance between what they can do to help and still enjoy their life. Living time is limited, free time is limited, vacation time is limited, budget is limited.

    Convenience is king and most people, rightly so, do not wish to live as slave of the environment if the quality of their life will suffer for it. It is not like we will be rewarded by mother earth for it. Nature does not gives a F and will give your child bone cancer even if you live the perfect life.
    So unless you manage to increase convenience and lower cost of environmental friendly alternative, you will be faced with a wall.

  13. 2 hours to work by Train.
    35 minutes by car.

    I used the Train when it made sense and I just had to travel from (small) city to city, but thats not the case anymore.

  14. It’s not cost.

    It’s convenience and time saved. If you’re not traveling city to city, cars are just way faster.

    wtf do i care about cost if my daily commute (one way) by car is 30-40 minutes and by train 2 hours.

  15. Starlactite on

    Hey, as a Frenchman (and a Parisian) I’ll chime in with what I saw.

    I’ve only ever been to Geneva (by train), did a one afternoon road trip around the Leman, and went to Lyon that same evening.

    First of all, one must distinguish train and train.

    There is inter city train, i.e Geneva to Lausanne and other

    And intra city train/trams, for commute between city and suburbs,and going from one side of the city to the other.

    Disregarding the price, Switzerland has great inter city trains. I saw them whizz by so often when I was near Montreux. They seem reliable and a realistic option (again, disregarding the price). At Conarvin, there were also many trains available. Different from Dallas where there are 3 trains a day.

    HOWEVER the intra city infrastructure appeared to be dogshit and 30 years behind. I was SHOCKED at Geneva urban planning. You have one if the most beautiful lake fronts possible, even possibly worthy of UNESCO status. What do you do? Build one big boulevard ON the Lakeshore. The boulevard is twice as big as the narrow path along the shore, and the noise the cars make make it genuinely unbearable. It should be one big beautiful,nation defining promenade. But its not. It’s noisy and ugh.

    Also, no bike paths and an overabundance on cars.

    It really felt like the city was built for Uber wealthy foreign dignitaries/oligarchs and their rolls royces.

  16. _Vodkahontas on

    Maybe because taking the train is much more expensive?

    Anual cost for insurance + gas + car tax + few parts and fluids for maintenance + motorway vignette + mfk cost once every few years is still less than GA for me. And don’t forgett all other positive perks that come with it. No drunk people, no stinky kebaps, not stuffed in a tin can, no people yelling at their phone and most important freedom regarding time schedule and its available 24/7.

    I fail to understand how people calculate ridiculus high cost/km here in the comments. Not everyone owns a new 80k+ CHF wagon that takes 10l for 100km and gives you 3k maintenance and 1.5k insurance cost a year.

    Buy used and repair yourself or don’t go to amag. And if something major like the gearbox or engine fails, bring the car to the next export seller , get a few bucks back and get another used one that drives.
    Perfectly fine for me. I don’t need the latest 360 camera or driving assistance.

    Or am I missing something here except people nowdays don’t even know how to check the brakes for ware or change wheels on a car let alone even know the major components you see when opening the hood?

  17. gggingerbean on

    … because the ticket prices are insane
    … because there are barely any trains or buses in rural areas
    … because the transportation is often unreliable due to delays or cancelations
    … because there are no buses and trains in the evening for rural areas
    … and the list goes on

  18. As a train lover myself, I think there are a few reasons why cars remain supreme.

    1. Train travel is relatively expensive especially once you turn 25 or are older, no NightGA, no youth group discounts, no FriendGA or anything like that. Cheapest case scenario are Super Saver tickets in addition to halbtax(if you are over 25) or 4K CHF GA if you travel everyday from major city to major city.

    2.If you live in a small town and your work is also in a small town somewhere far, car travel is easily twice as fast. For example if you go from a random house in Littau to the ABB offices in baden you will go faster by car then by Public transport which would require you at least 2 changes plus some walking. And to the people who want to say why don’t these people move closer to their work, lets not forget how the rules for getting swiss citizenships work and that a good amount of the people living in CH don’t have a citizenship and those wanting to get one are effectively locked into the town/canton they first moved in.

    Big City center to Big city center train is superior though.

    3. Convienence and Cheaper for transporting multiple people. Especially if you and your friends are older then 25 years old, it can get expensive to get train tickets to go somewhere, while with a car that you already use for other purposes its 40-60 CHF of petrol in total for very long trips(and you can divide that 4-5 ways). Also you are not stuck to schedules and can go anywhere(even flat places without asphalt).

    Get a bunch of these factors together and you can see why people tend to go for Cars.

  19. Mostly a question of habits when you don’t live in a remote place. My dad drives 1.5km by car to work for the last 50.years, while he could totally do that by bicycle.

  20. I’m using public transport and live in a city but we are a family of 4 and our life quality is lower because we don’t have a car. It’s hard to do family trips and even then we have to rent a car. Which is in itself a pain in the ass since I have to install baby chairs every single time. My wife want us to buy a car but with 10k per year I’m reluctant to buy it.

  21. MarquesSCP on

    As someone who owns a car that uses it to commute to work every day (because it’s that much quicker and not more expensive than a GA, or just marginally) + also has a Halbtax to visit the city closest to me and go to the airport.

    Just tax cars/petrol/vignette etc and make PT cheaper or free. PT should cost what it does with halbtax at most.

    You can’t win this fight by convincing people that they can’t live without a car/shouldn’t have one. You win this fight by making people use the car that they already own (for a multitude of reasons that it’s impossible to get rid of) less.

    People use whatever means of transportation because of convenience, not because of price (unless it’s a significant different). I have a car and I go to Zurich with train even if it’s slightly slower and more expensive because it is more convenient. But for other cases it is both less convenient (or just about the same) AND more expensive.

  22. Emergency-Job4136 on

    I find public transport more comfortable than driving because I can check my phone, have a snack, watch a video, have a beer with friends before my journey and not worry about finding somewhere to park. Unfortunately I realise that most drivers in Switzerland do all of these things behind the wheel anyway.

  23. polyglotconundrum on

    Swiss person who moved to the US here.
    It makes me sad to see cars being chosen over public transport, because while I do understand the incentives, I miss being able to take a train or a bus every single fucking day.
    Growing up in CH I’ve realized how important PT is for the health of a society; understanding mutual spaces, respecting that space, not to mention the mental health and climate implications.
    I beg of y’all, don’t take it for granted.
    I wish I could sit on a train to work reading a book like I used to. Now I’m stuck in shitty ass American traffic instead.

  24. billy001234 on

    I did Winterthur-Thun twice a week for nearly a year when i was in the army, i did it a few times with my car. The car was faster and cheaper, even tho i do not have the most efficient car. Even when Thun-Winterthur has very good connections i still save like 1h

  25. Electrical-Pie925 on

    There is a village in 5 minutes away from me by car. Same village is 1 hour away by public transport because I have to go all the way to the city and then back.

  26. For me, it was always because driving to the district main town took me 15-25 minutes by car and 2h by train…

    That and school on top in the city with inconvenient times in regards to trains, I saved more than 20h per week of free time by driving instead of the train.

    And to add salt to injury, the regional monthly pass was not even 50 franks less than the GA, but I didn’t have any use for a GA as I didn’t have the time to travel anywhere else.

    My used japanese hybrid car from 2012 drinks about 5l/100km, doesn’t need loads of attention from the garage, the insurance is relatively affordable as I don’t want to pay for full casco for a used car…and yeah, that came cheaper as taking transit on top of the whole time losses.

  27. cavallotkd on

    In my opinion one of the underlying causes for traffic is that many people are forced to commute even when their job can be done completely in remote.

    For applicable jobs, give employees the choice to work from home as much as they want, without any company interference about the maxinum numbers of days this is allowed

    As collateral, also enjoy better mental health, reduced pollution, more free time for family friends and exercise and significant savings in own salary

Leave A Reply