Travel experts warn that travel could reach its limits in the next few days.
Whit Monday is a national holiday. Many Germans will use the long weekend for small excursions. The Pentecost holidays also begin in Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.
It doesn’t matter whether you are traveling by car, motorbike or mobile home: be prepared for long traffic jams. Flights may experience check-in delays. But trains and buses are also getting fuller because many could use the Germany ticket.
Long queues and frustration at the airport
Due to a lack of staff in baggage handling and in the security area, there are currently problems at many German airports. Travelers must expect waiting times of several hours to check in.
Why are there long waiting times at the airport?
The problem is known from last year. Even then, there was a shortage of staff at German airports and airlines because there were staff cuts due to the corona pandemic.
Since then, airports and airlines have had difficulties recruiting the missing staff. The application process is ongoing and there is a shortage of applicants.
In extreme cases, the situation could worsen in the summer months – similar to the previous year. As early as the summer of 2022, many airlines were overwhelmed by the rush. Especially with low-cost airlines, travelers sometimes had to wait in line for several hours before they could even reach the check-in counter.
FOCUS Online advises:
1. Get to the airport on time. In particular, if you have baggage to check in, you should be at the airport at least three hours before the scheduled departure for flights within the EU. For departures outside the EU, four hours are appropriate.
2. Think about the waiting time at the security check. Because many people only book flight fares with hand luggage for cost reasons, the security check is also delayed. Many pieces of baggage have to be checked again, which means that this process takes longer. Expect long waiting times on the Pentecost weekend and in the summer months. Compared to check-in, you cannot use online services in advance at the security checkpoint.
3. Note flight status. Is there a delay? Has the departure changed and do you now have to go to a different gate? Find out about possible changes in advance. You can check the current flight status via the airline’s app and the airport’s website.
4. Think about your documents. You must present your ticket and identification document (identity card or passport) at check-in and at the security check.
Full trains threaten because of the Germany ticket
The federal and state governments recently introduced the Germany ticket. With a subscription, travelers can use local public transport for a calendar month for 49 euros. The ticket is also valid in the DB Regio network of Deutsche Bahn. As a result, holidaymakers can travel across Dusseldorf with the regional express, the regional train or the Interregio-Express. City trips are particularly popular.
Not only the 49-euro ticket could cause train frustration! Numerous construction sites slow down traffic over Pentecost. At Deutsche Bahn, construction activity over the long weekend is concentrated primarily in the north, west and south-west.
“On the Hamburg-Hanover-Munich axis, hourly connections with a travel time extension of around 60 minutes are offered, and on the Hamburg-Kassel-Frankfurt axis there are still three every two-hour lines,” says Deutsche Bahn and more. So travelers should plan their time.
train is full! When am I no longer allowed to board?
If you can, you should avoid the trains that are in such demand. If the train is full, a ride is not guaranteed.
FOCUS Online learned from the train: For safety reasons, travelers have to get off when a train is more than 200 percent occupied – i.e. when there are more than twice as many passengers as there are seats on the train. If necessary, this will be enforced with the help of the federal police
Here’s what you can do about it:
1. Ideally, check whether the train is overloaded or not. The DB Navigator app can help with this.
2. Switch to private providers, IC, EC or ICE. If local trains are overloaded, you can switch to long-distance trains or third-party providers. However, the 49-euro ticket is not valid on these trains. You can also save money on popular routes due to reduced demand.
3. If the train is congested, check if a 1st class seat reservation is available, also check if there are alternative train services or private bus companies that can take you to your destination.
There is a traffic jam on the freeway here
As the ADAC reports, there is a risk of long traffic jams in the metropolitan areas of Hamburg, Berlin, Stuttgart, Cologne, Frankfurt and Munich on the Pentecost weekend. This also applies to the trunk roads to the North Sea and Baltic Sea and on the following routes:
- A1 Cologne – Dortmund – Bremen – Lübeck
- A2 Dortmund – Hanover – Berlin
- A1/A3/A4 Cologne Ring
- A3 Oberhausen – Frankfurt – Nuremberg – Passau
- A4 Kirchheim triangle – Erfurt – Dresden
- A5 Hattenbacher Dreieck – Frankfurt – Karlsruhe – Basel
- A6 Kaiserslautern – Mannheim – Heilbronn – Nuremberg
- A7 Hamburg-Flensburg
- A7 Hamburg – Hanover – Würzburg – Füssen/Reutte
- A8 Karlsruhe – Stuttgart – Munich – Salzburg
- A9 Munich – Nuremberg – Berlin
- A10 Berlin Ring
- A11 Berliner Ring – Uckermark triangle
- A19 Triangle Wittstock/Dosse – Rostock
- A24 Berlin – Wittstock/Dosse triangle
- A61 Mönchengladbach – Koblenz – Ludwigshafen
- A81 Stuttgart – singing
- A93 Inntal triangle – Kufstein
- A95 / B2 Munich – Garmisch-Partenkirchen
- A99 Bypass Munich