Utilization leaves a lot to be desired: Greens on a promotional tour for the X-Bus
Created: 05/22/2022, 17:00
By: Peter Herrmann
Feeling comfortable in the express bus: Members of the Wolfratshauser and Geretsrieder Grünen drove to their Tölz party friends on Friday.
© Peter Herrmann
The local Greens want better utilization of the new lines.
During a drive through the district, they advertised.
Bad Tölz-Wolfratshausen – Lines X970 and X320 have been in operation between Starnberg, Wolfratshausen, Geretsried and Bad Tölz and between Wolfratshausen and Furth for almost six months.
However, according to the Greens, the use of cheap public transport leaves a lot to be desired.
Reason enough for the local associations from Wolfratshausen, Geretsried and Bad Tölz to bang the advertising drum.
A few minutes late, the express bus stops on Friday afternoon at the bus stop on Sauerlacher Straße in Wolfratshausen, which is opposite the train station.
The driver immediately recognizes the wheelchair of a waiting passenger and makes it easier for him to get on with a mobile ramp.
He is followed by the Wolfratshausen Green City Councilors Dr.
Hans Schmidt, Jennifer Layton, the Beuerberg district councilor Jakob Koch and other Greens members.
Marius Schlosser and other Greens then join them in front of the Geretsried town hall, so that the bus is well filled with a good two dozen passengers – including a 13-year-old schoolboy and some commuters.
Bad Tölz-Wolfratshausen: Green local groups drive X-Bus
The tour group knows that this high occupancy rate is rather unusual.
"Sometimes I'm almost alone on the bus, but the fare and the frequency are very pleasant," explains Andreas Sander.
As a lawyer, he often represents clients at the Wolfratshausen district court and prefers to use public transport to get there and back.
The express bus reaches its penultimate stop about 35 minutes after leaving Wolfratshausen.
The cool vaulted cellar of the Tölzer Mühlfeld brewery, which is only a few meters away, is ideal for a lecture by Jakob Koch followed by a debate in high summer temperatures.
"We must," says the Wolfratshausen Green Hans-Georg Anders, "exhaust all possibilities so that this great bus is preserved."
Thomas Maurer, local spokesman for the Tölzer Greens, agrees.
His son recently took the bus to a football game in Geretsried in referee equipment.
With a nine-euro ticket, switching is even more worthwhile financially
With the nine-euro monthly ticket approved by the Federal Council on Friday, such journeys are even cheaper.
"You've almost recovered the expenses for a return trip with the express bus," calculates Marius Schlosser.
He works in the office of Karl Bär, member of the Bundestag in Holzkirch, and advocates a long-term reduction in car traffic while at the same time giving preference to bus and rail traffic.
In his lecture, Jakob Koch also referred to the achievement of ambitious climate goals, which go hand in hand with less land use and social participation.
The young district councilor expects the number of inhabitants in the district to increase from the current 127,000 to 137,000 in the next 16 years.
Of these, around 63 percent use at least one car.
"Local public transport must ensure the provision of services of general interest for mobility in the entire district and should form an attractive and sustainable alternative to motorized private transport in the medium term," says Koch.
“The express bus only becomes a model for success at the district level if the capacity utilization is higher”
He admits that this is a financial burden for the district.
The operating costs of the express bus would be around 2.45 million euros a year, with the Free State paying around 1.6 million euros.
About 300,000 euros would probably be taken from ticket sales this year, which means that the district would have to cope with a deficit of 558,000 euros in 2022.
"Unfortunately, this money is missing elsewhere in the district budget," regrets Koch.
His conclusion: the express bus only becomes a successful model at district level if capacity utilization is higher.
In order to make the offer better known to foreigners living in the district, Lena Gneist suggests the creation of pictograms and multilingual information signs.
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At the end of the approximately three and a half hour advertising tour, Jakob Koch also reached his connecting bus to Beuerberg at the Wolfratshausen train station.
The coordination of the timetables with other regional bus lines and the S-Bahn worked perfectly, at least on this day.
Peter Herrmann
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