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A 300-franc voucher for every child: Lucerne wants to break new ground in promoting public transport with a pilot project.
The daughter drives weekly to football practice on the other side of town, the son to piano lessons – both use the bus. The annual costs for this: twice an annual subscription of around 600 francs, so a total of a good 1200 francs. The fictitious example shows that your children’s leisure activities can cost quite a bit. No wonder there are parents who prefer to drive their children back and forth by car. Or who even have to deny them the hobby.
In Lucerne, this should be different in the future – thanks to massive discounts on subscriptions for children. The city government proposes a voucher system for this. Families would receive 300 francs a year for each child between the ages of 6 and 16, which can be used for subscriptions, multi-journey tickets or day tickets. The annual subscription would only cost half as much as it does today.
Children launched the idea themselves
The city government did not come up with the idea of its own accord, it originally came from the Lucerne Children’s Parliament, which two years ago called for strong public transport concessions. Francesca Ambauen and Finn Krummenacher are pleased that the idea is now being supported by the government. The two launched the initiative as members of the Children’s Parliament at the time.
Legend:
Bus driving is also a matter of getting used to: Francesca Ambauen and Finn Krummenacher.
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Francesca Ambauen, who is now 14, says: “Of course I hope that many children will use public transport more often and be able to go to their leisure activities or to school independently.” And 15-year-old Finn Krummenacher adds that it is also about an important experience for later: “If you get to know public transport early on, you will use it later.”
If you get to know public transport early on, you will use it later.
With the voucher idea, the Lucerne city government is breaking new ground in Switzerland. That’s why it’s difficult to estimate whether the vouchers will actually be redeemed: “We’re the forerunners here,” says the responsible city councilor Adrian Borgula, “that’s why we can’t fall back on any empirical values.”
The city government makes an estimate anyway. She expects annual costs of almost 1.7 million Swiss francs. The project will initially run as a trial and be evaluated for three years.
FDP is skeptical: “Wrong incentives”
But it is not yet decided, the city parliament will definitely decide. There are also skeptical voices, at least from the bourgeois side. The discount of 300 francs is “very high,” says FDP city parliamentarian Marc Lustenberger. “The money is distributed with the watering can and gives us the wrong incentives.”
City Councilor Adrian Borgula counters that it is “not primarily a social project, but above all a funding project for public transport.” That is why it should benefit everyone. In Lucerne, there would be 7,400 children who would benefit from the vouchers. If parliament says yes, the project should start next summer.