If you follow German news from last night, they were all hyped up over a new railway accomplishment.
The ICE (the high-speed railway of Germany) has opened up a new route between Munich and Berlin. It's a 623 km route (392 miles). They ran the first train on the route....taking just under four hours....dropping the old time down by two hours.
In general, there's around 1.8 million people who used this railway service in an average year. Some folks think that it'll increase now because of the shorter time.
Cost to reach this level? Ten billion Euro. A fairly big chunk of money.
Normal flight time? You can figure around 80 minutes for the flight itself, and another 120 minutes for the security, check-in and luggage pick-up. So it's near 3.5 hours to play the flight game.
It's an enticement. I could see the railway folks advertising in both the Munich and Berlin areas with a massive appeal....beat the stress of air-travel.
If you think about it....you get the taxi to pick you up and drop you off at the side door of the Munch station. You have a pre-booked seat and simply walk to the ramp, and board the train ten minutes prior to leaving. You have a reserved seat, and a free Wi-Fi situation. If you need refreshments, you make your way to the middle of the train and sit down to have a beer. At the end of the trip, you simply get up and walk out of the station to another taxi.
The odds of airline flights decreasing between Munch and Berlin? I'd take a guess that in four years, you might see forty-percent less flights occurring.
One last footnote to this four-hour ride....some folks are suggesting that real estate in both Munich and Berlin....will go through a pricing change because of this great addition coming to their communities. This is a hard deal to analyze and figure out. Maybe on the high-end housing, it might be a plus of some kind.
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