Reorienting quality regulation. Germany’s rail infrastructure is in a poor state of repair. This is evident, amongst other things, from the high number of ageing tracks and points, and the many railway bridges in need of refurbishment. The result is numerous delays and train cancellations, to the detriment of passengers and shippers. As the current regulatory framework fails to address this issue, a reorientation of railway regulation is urgently needed. “Regulation must provide stronger incentives for the infrastructure operator to invest sustainably in the quality of the infrastructure,” said the Chair of the Monopolies Commission. To this end, the Monopolies Commission recommends that quality assurance be enshrined in future within the framework of charge regulation. In this context, the train path charges that the infrastructure manager can levy on railway undertakings should be linked to the achievement of specific quality targets – such as punctuality or network size. This creates genuine incentives for the infrastructure operator to ensure better quality in the rail sector. Furthermore, all other control mechanisms must be reviewed to ensure they are quality-oriented. In this regard, the Monopolkommission welcomes the fact that funding is finally to be made available for existing infrastructure from the resources of the Performance and Financing Agreement, which until now has only subsidised new investments. The Monopolies Commission has been calling for such an extension for some time. It will ensure that the railway infrastructure is no longer run ‘into the ground’. Furthermore, it is strongly recommended that the quality targets set by the regulator in this context be linked to the remuneration of DB’s management. To achieve this, a structural cultural shift within the DB Group’s leadership is absolutely essential. The leadership must feel a much stronger commitment to all infrastructure customers than has been the case to date. 

Enabling competition in sales. A further prerequisite for competition on the railways is competition in sales. Only then can the DB Group’s competitors be more readily noticed and booked by passengers. Passengers can benefit directly from this through lower ticket prices. This is demonstrated by experience in other countries, such as Spain. In the German market, however, independent sales service providers find it difficult to gain a foothold. This is primarily because the DB Group withholds infrastructure data – particularly regarding expected arrival and departure times – from competing sales companies in order to favour its own sales operations.