International rail travel is not new to Europe. The first tracks that crossed borders opened nearly 200 years ago, as coal-burning steam engines spread the Industrial Revolution through the continent and enabled the mass movement of people and goods.
But the rise of cars and planes have made train journeys less appealing, and today, even as Europe seeks to clean up its economy, the railway system is burdened by high prices and fragmented systems. In some countries – such as Germany, which long distance travellers will struggle to avoid – chronic underinvestment has led to frequent delays that can ruin a holiday or work trip.
Some of these problems seem easily fixable. When I travel from Berlin to London, a journey I make a few times a year, I have to book two separate tickets. If the first trains are late, which they often are, and I miss my connection, I can’t just jump on the next available train across the Channel – I have to buy a whole new ticket.
Similar issues occur at the booking stage, with many operators blocking external platforms from selling their tickets, according to nonprofit Transport and Environment (T&E). Some even hide competitors’ offers on their own sites.
This already puts people off climate-friendly transport. A YouGov poll commissioned by T&E and published on Wednesday found more than 60% of long-distance rail travellers have avoided journeys because booking is a hassle, while 43% would use rail more if booking online were easier.
The EU has promised to address these issues with a single ticketing regulation, which is to be proposed before the end of the year – essentially, allowing you to book the cheapest route with just one click – but customers and green groups are still frustrated that little is being done to help trains compete with planes on price.
The Greenpeace study this summer looked at 109 cross-border routes in Europe and found that trains beat planes on just 39% of routes – a small improvement since they first ran the analysis two years ago. In France, Spain and the UK, trains were more expensive than flights on more than 90% of the cross-border routes they examined.
Why is it so much cheaper to fly than take the train? A big reason is tax. Unlike drivers and train travellers, fliers do not have to pay tax on jet fuel, and plane tickets are mostly exempt from VAT.
Transport scientists have found that removing the exorbitant subsidies that the aviation industry enjoys would help level the playing field and free up public money to invest in crumbling railways. They have also suggested policies such as frequent flier levies – which increase the tax on each subsequent flight a person takes in a year – could spread the burden so business travellers and extreme jet-setters shoulder most of the costs.
Much of the motivation for this is to address the societal costs that flying brings. If you factor in the damage that planet-heating pollution does to economies – from hotter heatwaves to stronger tropical cyclones – then aviation becomes even less attractive for a government to prop up. The UN-backed Corsia system to offset and reduce emissions, which becomes mandatory in 2027, addresses only a fraction of these costs.
Think about it another way. Last year, a study pegged the “social cost of carbon” at about €244 per ton. If trains and planes factored in the social cost of carbon, a train from Barcelona to London would cost just couple more euros, but it would make the flight nearly five times more expensive.From that perspective, the question is less, “Why are flights so cheap?” and more, “Who actually pays for them?”
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