[lorenzfx]

> Here in Germany, for as long as I can remember, the government praises itself every year for investing as much in rail as never before.

Unfortunately, that's not true (the investment part). In preparation for the IPO (that never happened because of the crash) Deutsche Bahn was heavily tuned for profit since the mid 90s which led to a massive decrease in investment. As rail infrastructure has a rather long service life, a lot of those cost-cutting measures have only beginning to be felt rather recently. Now not only do the investments that have not been made have to be made up for, but the funding gap has caused the infrastructure to decay even further.

Also, a lot of money has been spent on vanity projects like Stuttgart 21, instead of much-needed extension of freight lines like the one in the upper Rhine valley.

[dx034]

Also, construction prices have gone up a lot. Rail investment depends heavily on steel and concrete, both have skyrocketed over past years. And as you said, undoing a decade or more of underinvestment is extremely costly and leads to more delays in the short term.