ON THE WAY TO BERLIN — Crossing from Switzerland into Germany on the 12:06 p.m. Intercity Express, passengers quickly trade Swiss punctuality for uncertainty. Elisabeth Eisel, a regular on the seven-hour run, remarks that Swiss services are unfailingly on time except when trains come from Germany — a blunt observation that, she adds, used not to be true.
Years of underinvestment have chipped away at the reputation for German rail efficiency. Deutsche Bahn long-distance services now rank among Europe’s least punctual. In October the operator set an unwanted record: roughly half of its long-distance trains arrived late. Reliability is only part of the problem. The state-owned company runs at a loss and passengers frequently encounter weak or no Wi‑Fi, mixed-up seat reservations, missing carriages and nebulous announcements blaming ‘technical problems.’
The government has unveiled a 100-billion-euro plan to rebuild rail infrastructure after decades of neglect. But passenger advocate Lukas Iffländer of Pro Bahn warns that cash alone will not fix systemic issues. He says the system has been paying for neglect dating back to 1998. Beyond worn tracks and outdated signaling, he points to an overly complex network operator and slow internal processes that frustrate employees who want to get work done.
Iffländer also describes an imbalanced workforce: too few train drivers and signal technicians, and too many managers. A report in Der Spiegel suggested some senior managers approved canceling long-distance services to improve punctuality statistics, since canceled trains do not count the same way. Deutsche Bahn rejected the implication that it manipulated figures, saying the report relied on private messages rather than official data.
The human consequence is tangible. On the 11:18 a.m. train from Munich to Berlin a last-minute cancellation left an Intercity Express packed far beyond capacity. Despite many passengers standing for hours with limited access to facilities, the atmosphere stayed unexpectedly upbeat. Passenger Catherine Launay, 51, visiting from France, joked that French travelers would have protested by then.
Deutsche Bahn has tried to ease tensions with staff and customers using a tongue-in-cheek mockumentary on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube about a crew dealing with absurd conditions. Its cheeky techno chorus caught on, even as onboard Wi‑Fi often cannot support streaming.
Sometimes the line between satire and reality blurs. On one service a conductor wished travelers a pleasant journey ‘as far as it’s possible,’ adding that they ‘should just about make it to Berlin.’ Federal Transport Minister Patrick Schnieder cautioned that repeated rail failures are seen by many as reflective of wider government dysfunction.
Some hope rests with new CEO Evelyn Palla, praised for her work at Austrian Federal Railways. Palla has pledged to slim management and improve operations but acknowledges the scale of the task and that meaningful change will take time.
As trains roll into Berlin Hauptbahnhof, many passengers accept the delays with weary resignation. Whether the root causes are failing signals, managerial problems or decades of underfunding, Germany’s railways face a long journey to regain the punctuality and reliability they once delivered.