Dutch train ticket prices around EU average despite announced increase
Despite the announced train ticket price increases, and more looming with NS still suffering losses, Dutch tickets cost around the EU average, NU.nl reports after looking at Eurostat figures and speaking to experts.
“We’re somewhere in the middle,” Wijnand Veeneman, a researcher in infrastructure and mobility at Delft University of Technology, told the newspaper. He isn’t a fan of price indexes like Eurostat’s, because they include too many variables. So he uses a simple calculation - how much does it cost to travel a certain number of kilometers from the capital to another station?
For example, the 125-kilometer trip from Amsterdam to Hengelo costs 31 euros. That is much more than the 133-km trip from Lisbon to Évora, which costs 16 euros. But significantly less than the 140-km trip from Copenhagen to Odense, which costs 52 euros. Belgium is also around the middle with a 35 euro ticket taking you 123 kilometers from Brussels to Libramont. France is also expensive at 52 euros to travel 127 kilometers from Paris to Reims. The United Kingdom and Poland are relatively cheap - 26 euros from London to Coventry (134 km) and 29 euros from Warsaw to Lódz (119 km).
Public transport in the Nehterlands is “absolutely not more expensive” than in the rest of Europe, Veeneman said. According to him, that idea persists because people tend to compare it to a car trip, which is very difficult to calculate for costs. Travelers often look only at the price per kilometer or the price of gasoline, but things like insurance, taxes, and maintenance should also be included.
The fact that Dutch public transport is more expensive than in some other European countries is because the “Dutch government invests proportionally less in public transport,” Bert van Wee, a professor of transport policy at Delft University of Technology, told the newspaper. Luxembourg’s public transport is free because the government subsidizes it heavily. The same is true in Spain. Other factors also play a role. Wages are also lower in countries like Portugal, Spain, Greece, and Romania. Staff costs are lower, so tickets can be cheaper.
Van Wee added that Netherlands residents also get a lot for their ticket price. “We score well in international comparisons.” Trains run mostly on time, train stations are of high quality, and the Netherlands has a dense rail network, so few disruptions hinder train traffic on a large scale. There are also “relatively many trains per day,” Van Wee said. In some countries, you have to wait an hour or more if your train is canceled. But at many Dutch central stations, at rain leaves every 15 minutes.
