This is how Berlin rips off tourists – BZ Berlin
Traffic turnaround, this buzzword popular with Ökos, only works with an upgraded BVG. More buses and trains, more lines and tighter cycles for environmentally friendly mobility. Also, the transport companies of Berlin’s future red-green-red Senate are not only dear, they are also expensive.
From Hildburg Bruns and Justus Jeep
Ticket receipts and state subsidies are not enough for the many wishes. Green front woman Bettina Jarasch (52) therefore proposes a mandatory ticket for every tourist as a new source of income – and higher parking fees for everyone.
“We will need them if we not only want to pursue what is already planned, but want to go beyond that,” said the Green politician to the Tagesspiegel.
These ideas have been discussed for a long time, now they seem to be concrete in the context of the coalition negotiations. Because with the desire for a city toll for motorists as a source of income, the Greens are biting granite with the coalition partners SPD and Left.
Rip off tourists even more (they have been paying city tax since 2014)?
Jarasch: “My impression is that it would hardly prevent tourists from coming to Berlin if they got a ticket with which they can move anywhere.”
“That is totally counterproductive and not thought through to the end,” complains Burkhard Kieker (60), head of VisitBerlin, to BZ “It torpedoes our welcoming culture and will weaken the BVG with a crowbar.” Because sales at vending machines would decline.
But the Greens calculate differently: If 5 euros / day are deducted in the hotel together with the overnight tax (children from six 2.50 euros), they would pay less than at the machine (currently 8.80 euros / day). The disadvantage: You also have to pay if you don’t even travel by bus or train.
“What else should tourists finance? Accommodation tax plus mandatory public transport ticket is unique and would negligently jeopardize the restart of Berlin tourism in European competition ”, Hans-Jörg Schulze, tourism expert at the Chamber of Commerce and Industry (IHK).
The Senate has already checked what the compulsory ticket would bring: If you offset additional income in the hotel with the failures at machines, it would be 65 to 175 million euros per year – depending on whether the ticket was 5 or 8 euros a day be set.
Berlin rips off its tourists … and they bring the city 17 billion a year
Tourists are dear to the city. Before the pandemic, they spent 17 billion euros a year, according to the Chamber of Commerce and Industry (IHK), and 200,000 Berliners make their living from visitors.
The following figures from a parliamentary question by MP Marcel Luthe (44, free voters) show how badly it hits the city when tourists stay away.
► Taxi driver: In the month before the outbreak of the first Corona case (February 2020) there were 6177 full-time drivers in the taxi business – in March 2021 there were only 4414.
You can also see it in the declining number of licenses: While there were more than 8,000 registered taxis before the pandemic, there are now only around 6,100. A decrease by a quarter!
► Handel: Tourists shopped in the capital in 2019 for around 5 billion euros. That corresponds to a quarter of the turnover of all Berlin shops.
► Overnight stays: During the pandemic, the number halved, this year there were 1.7 million overnight stays up to July. The number of hotel employees decreased from 15,158 (February 2020) to 11,799 (March 2021).
► City tax: The accommodation tax was introduced eight years ago. In 2019 she brought in 55 million euros for the Senator of Finance, this year only 8 million (until October).
► Gastronomy: Here, too, the number of permanent employees fell from 23,102 (February 2020) to 19,859 (March 2021).
► BVG: It is not possible to precisely quantify the fare income from tourists, but there was a customer survey about their origin, which suggests: In 2019 tourists provided 15% of the income (129.6 million euros), in the pandemic year 2020 only 8 percent (58 million euros) .). Euros) and in the current year 10 percent (46 million euros).