Work on the signal box Train cancellation at Bonn central station to last until Friday

Bonn · The train cancellation at Bonn Central Station caught many passengers cold on Tuesday morning. Deutsche Bahn had not announced the closure of the section between Roisdorf and Bad Godesberg separately. Not only customers, but also the passenger association Pro Bahn criticised the railway.

 "Due to construction work, train services are currently suspended," reads the display at Bonn Central Station on Tuesday. Photo: Lisa Inhoffen

"Due to construction work, train services are currently suspended," reads the display at Bonn Central Station on Tuesday. Photo: Lisa Inhoffen

Foto: Lisa Inhoffen

One person didn't get to work on time, another was on pins and needles because of an important job interview in Cologne: On Tuesday morning, Deutsche Bahn drove many customers not only into a sweat, but into despair. The reason was the sudden and poorly announced cancellation of the entire train service between Roisdorf and Bad Godesberg. Annoyed passengers came to Bonn's main station for nothing. This will continue until Friday.

Only when they arrived at the station did signs indicate that train services were "currently suspended". The reason for this was the interlocking work in Cologne, which had been going on for weeks. Service staff dressed in signal red looked after the perplexed and angry rail customers.

"Now I can't get to my job interview on time," said René Klaus from Niederkassel. The young man wanted to go to Cologne; he had already been looking for alternative options for an hour. He had checked the DB timetable app as late as 9 a.m. “There was no sign of any timetable changes," he said. A random check by the GA on Tuesday afternoon showed that most train connections, for example to Cologne, were displayed on time.

Such a state of affairs is not uncommon; it often takes him more than an hour to get from the city centre to Bad Godesberg, said Bale Ullah, who has been living in Bonn for 22 years. He no longer even looks at the app: "Sometimes the information there is correct, sometimes not. It's just annoying," he said. He hurried on with his young family to get to an urgent appointment at the university hospital. Niklas Hammer and Jens Trütken also only noticed the train cancellations when they arrived. Twenty years ago, there was a saying, "On time like the Deutsche Bahn", a woman said as she passed by - without any sarcasm.

On Tuesday, the DB press office did not provide any details on how the situation would develop over the next few days. A spokesperson referred to the press release of 27 December, which praised the renewal of the interlocking technology. Passengers will benefit from "more quality and punctuality" in the future. What the construction work will mean for passengers is not specifically stated. There is talk of recurring partial cancellations on the left side of the Rhine between 3 January and 18 February, but no dates are given.

When asked, one of the DB men at the main station said he assumed that the trains would not run until Friday. "If you want to go to Cologne, you will have to take the 16 or 18." He still referred to the rail replacement service at Quantiusstraße, which runs in the direction of Roisdorf station or even all the way to Cologne. There is a bus every 15 minutes. The traffic behind the station was correspondingly busy - with honking taxis, buses, cars and also cyclists in traffic jams. GA reader Volkhard Stern asked about the commuter flows. Many probably now take the light rail by necessity: "Isn't this all irresponsible during the pandemic, when many travel options with plenty of space are important?" he said.

When asked about the train cancellation, the railway spokesperson reacted with incomprehension. No individual announcements could be made about "every construction phase". Travellers could find out about individual cancellations on the usual portals. But you have to find them first via the complicated search at zuginfo.nrw. There you will also find a poster that provides detailed information about cancellations - available at https://kurzelinks.de/bahnausfall. There, in a long list in small print, you learn that the full closure between Roisdorf and Bonn will last from 5 a.m. on 31 January until 9 p.m. on Friday, 4 February. What about the bad app experiences of some customers with the diversion of long-distance traffic? - no information.

The Zweckverband Nahverkehr Rheinland (NVR), responsible for local rail transport, is also on board. It is also responsible for making arrangements for larger construction sites, such as the one at the signal boxes. "We can only apologise to the passengers," said NVR spokesman Holger Klein about the lack of information for passengers. He admitted on Tuesday that the large number of closures made it very difficult for customers to find out which trains were running and which were not.

The passenger association Pro Bahn criticised the information policy of the railway on Tuesday: "If the Bonn main station is not served for several days, this must be communicated more intensively," said the NRW regional chairman Andreas Schröder to the GA. Young people in particular used the DB Navigator app, which probably did show the diversion via the right side of the Rhine. "The older passengers, on the other hand, go to the station and look down the tube," Schröder said. "Information about such a measure must be more open, more transparent and more extensive." In view of the fact that several railway companies are responsible, he would like to see better coordination in press relations.

For example, only the RE 23 to Rheinbach stops at Bonn central station these days. By the way, on Tuesday there was another problem, as could be read elsewhere. The line between Beuel and Koblenz was closed due to a track disruption. There were delays and diversions in long-distance traffic.

Original text: Simun Sustic, Richard Bongartz and Lisa Inhoffen. Translation: Mareike Graepel

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