The end of summer also sounded the end of Germanys9 public transport ticket a tenth of its usual price.
Unsurprisingly popular with commuters, it left people wondering what was next.
This week the Berlin Senate has announced its plan to secure funds for reduced-price BVG tickets.
Did the 9 ticket get people out of their cars?
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A whopping one in five buyers had never used public transport before.
The research found that ticket purchases were twice as common in urban areas.
Excuse me if I find this a little underwhelming.
What was the environmental impact of the 9 ticket?
This equates toover 387,845 gasoline-powered passenger vehiclesdriven for one year.
This number only increased.
Theres something inherently problematic about incarceration for not-paying a transport fine.
Its reasons vary from deliberate to accidental.
The German capital also has a long history of resistance when it comes to paying for public transport.
A fund for fare dodging?
The day after the 9 ticket ended, a campaign popped up in Germany for cheap transport.
Called9 Euro Fonds, it invites people to pay a monthly 9 fee into a collective pot.
Any fines are then paid by the collective.
Its not the first initiative of this kind;similar schemesexisted in France and Belgium in the late 1990s.
But the idea is perilous.
First off, you have no recourse if the fund fails to grow large enough to cover fines.
Is the future free public transport?
There are over 100public transportschemes globally.
Story byCate Lawrence
Cate Lawrence is an Australian tech journo living in Berlin.
