German railway desperation: On time performance through early closing of doors

Almost identical news articles in Spiegel Online and Frankfurter Allgemeine  deal with the latest improvement Deutsche Bahn plans to roll out in order to improve its on time performance.

Closing train doors earlier!

The once "legendary" on time performance of German trains has lost its luster, says the press. These days, a train is counted as being on time if it is no more than six minutes late.

And the blogster still uses the old joke when an Italian co-worker says "in five minutes".

Blogster: Five German or five Italian minutes.

No more, RIP oddly dated joke.

Even with the six minutes, current on time performance is at 74.4% (as of 2015).

A pilot project will allow conductors to close, or rather lock, the doors one minute prior to departure. The CEO of Deutsche Bahn explained that he himself once arrived 30 seconds late and saw the train leave.

The operative word in his explanation was very likely "once".

In olden days in the US, train station clocks would be set to be one minute early. But that won't work in modern Germany because half the clocks are broken and the other half are wired to some atomic clock.

On time performance has not been the issue the blogster and other passengers have suffered under.

Our problem is the transfer schedules.

In older train stations, would be passengers who transfer from long distance to regional or local trains get, pardon the expression, screwed over by the combination of tight schedules and last minute platform changes.

The basic setup goes like this:
1) The train you are on is scheduled to arrive on a platform next to the train you need to catch.
2) The schedule gives you one minute to cross the platform.
3) The train you are on is re-routed to a different platform, within the six minute window of course. It is on time.
4) If you are physically fit, you try to run. If you are older or not in great shape...forget it.
5) The train you needed to catch leaves - on time.

Your next train is in one hour, if you are lucky and do not travel after say 8 pm.

This has happened every single time the blogster ventured out on a long distance - local connection in the past years.

The result: the blogster pays a friend to take it* to the international airport.

* Gender neutral.