Rail needs a year longer
Stuttgart 21 will not start before 2026
10.06.2024, 19:58
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The time and cost plan for Stuttgart 21 are completely out of control. Instead of the estimated three billion euros, around twelve billion euros will probably have to be invested. The original start date of 2019 is already well past. But: According to a report, the bad news for the railways continues.
Stuttgart 21 will apparently not be able to go into operation until December 2026 at the earliest. This would mean that Germany’s most controversial rail project would be delayed by another year. After several postponements, the rail hub was actually supposed to go into operation in 2025. But that will definitely not happen. This is reported by “Spiegel” citing several sources in the rail group involved in the project. The rail company plans to present a statement on Tuesday at a meeting of the so-called steering committee. This steering committee for the major project includes representatives from the city, state, region and rail company.
In March, the state-owned company claimed, according to a report in “Spiegel”, that commissioning was still planned “for December 2025”. However, even then it was restricted to the fact that the order in which things would go into operation had to be determined “in detail”.
At the time, the company had suggested setting up a temporary signal box and gradually putting the undersized tunnel station into operation. This solution would have meant that trains would continue to serve the old terminal station.
Temporary solution clearly too expensive
According to the report, the plans for this pseudo-commissioning are now off the table – due to planning and delivery difficulties and probably also because the construction of a temporary signal box alone would have cost a high three-digit million sum. This would have made the major project, which was already spiraling out of control, even more expensive than it already was.
Deutsche Bahn is currently expecting costs of eleven billion euros. According to estimates by people involved in the project, these are likely to rise to at least twelve billion euros or more. At the start of construction, the company had assumed construction costs of around three billion euros and commissioning in December 2019. Deutsche Bahn did not want to comment on the postponement when asked by “Spiegel” and referred to a press conference planned for tomorrow, Tuesday.