Following the September 2017 election and long-running negotiations Chancellor Angela Merkel finally formed a "grand coalition" with her CDU party plus its conservative Bayern sister party the CSU and the Social Democrats (SPD) in March 2018. As before, the Transport Ministry is headed by a CSU politician. The agreement rules out privatisation for DB and However, despite the worthy objectives little new government money is available and other aspects of transport policy will not assist achievement of some of the aims. The new government has agreed that lorries from 7Vi tonnes upwards will now pay road tolls on the main national road network but long distance buses will still pay nothing on any part of the road network. This is in contrast to trains, whose operators are facing increases of 3.2% (long distance trains), 2.8% (freight) and 1.8% for regional trains/S-Bahn from 2019 in access charges.
展开▼
