In Monheim am Rhein, from the 1. April 2020 all inhabitants go for free by bus. The small town between Leverkusen and Dusseldorf is thus the only municipality in North Rhine-Westphalia, in which the burgers have to pay for public transport nothing more. The city plans to spend more than three and a half million euros.
Free only for locals
During people who do not live in Monheim, continue to buy tickets, have more than 43.000 inhabitants receive the so-called Monheim Pass, which acts as a ticket within the city and also free the use of the city library. Anyone who goes into the neighboring coarse floor Koln and Dusseldorf, is just just under the half. The decision is "clearly climate protection-motivated," said Burgermeister Daniel Zimmermann of the DPA. At the aim of significantly reducing the CO2 outlet of the city by 2030, the traffic is an important saule "and since we have not achieved a saving yet".
With the mapping, the burgermeister wants to animate the opportunity driver, especially to drive by bus. "You can force people to drive more bus and train, how the Dusseldorf makes with the environmental track," said Zimmermann, "or you tried to create attractive alternatives to the car". This makes monheim in NRW a pioneering role. "I wives all the attentive to watch what we do here," said Zimmermann. A spokeswoman of the NRW Ministry of Transport declared, a burelf "Any maaking that serves the OPNV attractive power and climate protection."But:" Free OPNV has not top priority from our point of view."
Monheim can afford it
That the city of Monheim is located in an exposed location, the burger master is also the burger master: "You can honestly say that that is expensive. Many city may not afford that, but it also depends on which priorities are as a city."Since the 37-year-old people with his local party Peto was chosen ten years ago to the then youngest burgermal of the country, he has wrestled the municipality concentrated. It is now regarded as a tax oase, nowhere else in NRW companies pay less commercial taxes. The economy in the city flourishes and provides for a full city forces, rendered on Monthen Millionuberschuss. As an example of other municipalities, Monheim is therefore only limited.
In the past three years, the small town had already largely expanded his network, the buses take place 1.4 now 2.1 million kilometers per year. However, this did not have a positive effect on how Zimmermann admits: "The user behavior is stagnated."In the short term Zimmermann also expects the Monheim Pass with more tracks. Just in the face of the corona crisis, hardly someone has barely bused. The autonomously driving minibuses, which take up the company until the end of February 2020, stay up to date in the garage. In the next three years, as long as the contract negotiated with the traffic companies, however, the burger master wants to see a significant increase – even if he says, "We deliberately do not want to set ourselves a specific goal."
Free: elsewhere already history
Alone is not with this concept in Germany: Since January bus driving in Augsburg is at least in the city center for free, including the Bavarian town of Pfaffenhoven offers the free OPNV. In the Brandenburg Templin, it was tried between 1998 and 2003. When not only the passenger numbers rose, but also the costs, the project was finished. From a quick end, Zimmermann takes distance, even if the service is running only three years: "If you introduce such a thing, then you have to import it permanently. This is not a matter for three years."