There will be another railway strike in Germany. After a month of negotiations, the GDL train drivers’ trade union at the railway carrier “Deutsche Bahn AG” has announced another strike, which is to start on Thursday 7 March at 2:00 a.m. and should end on Friday 8 March at 1:00 p.m. The strike will disrupt the operation of some services running from the Czech Republic to Germany and back. The restrictions will affect in particular the trains on the Prague – Berlin / Hamburg / Kiel / Flensburg railway line and regional fast trains in the Cheb – Marktredwitz relation. On the night before the strike (6/7 March), night trains to and from Germany will not run either. Due to the extent of the strike, passengers must expect that services will still be affected even after the official end of the strike, i.e. still for most of the day on Friday. We would like to ask passengers to follow the up-to-date information on the České dráhy’s web site or in the My Train application.
We recommend travelling to/from Germany during the strike period by Wednesday afternoon, 6 March, or postponing the travels until Saturday, 9 March. During the strike period, it is necessary to count on a significantly reduced railway traffic in a majority of the territory of Germany. Passengers who do not use their tickets because of the strike can either return them for a full refund or use their tickets until 15 March. The tickets are no longer linked to a specific mandatory train. Passengers are advised to purchase seat reservations for their new journeys.
Measures adopted in long-distance transport
As a result of the strike on the German railways, we will have to adjust the route of the long-distance EC Berliner trains, which on Thursday and Friday will run only on the Prague – Dresden railway line section and will not continue to their destinations, such as Berlin, Hamburg, Kiel or Flensburg.
The long-distance Hungaria trains will also run to Dresden only during the strike period, with an obligatory transfer to another train required at the Praha hl.n. railway station.
Night trains will already be affected by the strike during the night of 6 – 7 March. The nightjet (Graz – Berlin) service is cancelled during the strike period and the Canopus (Prague – Zurich) service runs only on the territory of the Czech Republic, i.e. on the Prague – Děčín railway line section. There will also be no direct Budapest – Břeclav – Berlin carriages on the EN 476 (Budapest – Břeclav) + NJ 456 (Břeclav – Berlin) trains. Night trains will return to the tracks without restrictions again on the night of 8 – 9 March.
All trains are operated with the use of replacement train sets with a lower capacity, and there are e.g. no dining cars in the train configurations.
The information about the operation on the Prague – Děčín – Dresden – Berlin – Hamburg / Kiel / Flensburg railway line can be found here.
Concerning the Bavarian Express trains between Prague and Munich, the railway connection will continue to be provided in the Prague – Plzeň – Domažlice section, but at the Plzeň hlavní nádraží railway station it will be necessary to change to another train. In the follow-up Domažlice – Furth im Wald – Regensburg section, České dráhy and the carrier “die Länderbahn” will provide passenger transport by a substitutive bus service (and the passengers are requested to change between buses at the Furth im Wald railway station). Trains will be running again on the Regensburg – Munich section. The same arrangements apply to journeys in the back direction.
The information about the operation on the railway line no. 180 can be found here.
Measures adopted in regional transport
During the strike period, there will again be no fast train services between Cheb and Marktredwitz in Bavaria. The trains on the Marktredwitz – Cheb – Aš – Hof railway line and back will run without restrictions on the days of the strike, but on 7 and 8 March the trains on the Cheb – Marktredwitz railway line section will be replaced by buses between 8:00 and 14:00 hours due to planned repairs on the railway line. The outage timetable can be found here. The trains on the U 28 line (Děčín – Bad Schandau – Sebnitz – Rumburk) will run without restrictions even during the strike period.
The information about the operation on the Cheb – Marktredwitz railway line can be found here.
Due to the extent of the strike, Deutsche Bahn expects the stabilisation of railway traffic to last for several hours after the official end of the strike, probably for the rest of Friday. The German railway network should return to normal operations on Saturday.
At the same time, the GDL trade union has publicly declared that it will announce further strike activities after the end of this strike without any prior notice period. Should these threats become reality, it is not in the powers of any railway carrier to provide passengers with alternative transport options or sufficient information about the situation which has occurred.
Passengers are asked to monitor up-to-date information and to plan their journeys while taking into account the current changes. Passengers can find all the latest information in the My Train application, on the www.cd.cz web site or on the social network X.
Author: Tiskové oddělení Českých drah
Release date: 6. 3. 2024
