More cars but less traffic on German roads - what do we make of it?

At first glance, this is good news - Germans travel less with cars than they did before the Corona pandemic.

Although the number of cars in Germany is increasing, there is less traffic on the country's motorways than before the coronavirus crisis.

However, the reason for that change is not - as I had hoped - the fact that more people use public transport, but the fact that people are commuting less. According to a survey by the Ifo Institute, around a quarter of all people were working from home in February 2024. The researchers found that this figure has remained almost constant since April 2022 - shortly after the pandemic-related obligation to work from home was lifted. According to the study, this means that the volume of traffic on working days at peak times, especially in the morning, is more than twelve per cent lower than in 2019.

If we want people to switch their car for a train or bus, we need to invest heavily into rail infrastructure and innovative mobility offerings - otherwise the actual underlying pattern won`t change. 

We can only hope that the governments in Europe and in particular Germany wake up to this reality and do their job - to tackle the biggest global challenge we have - climate change!

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)