At a Crossroads

It appears that the debate over a high-speed Airport/downtown connection may go on longer than the construction of the new line itself. 9 months after voting down a magnetic high-speed train, which would have been the pride of Germany yet cost locals more than $6 billion, the debate lingers about the best way to connect the airport to the city center. The trip on current S-bahn lines takes about 45 minutes, seemingly a little too long to get drivers off the roads. After several traffic studies, there still is not a decision on how to proceed. Some ideas include a non-stop S-bahn train along the S-8 line, which would shave at least 15 min off the trip. Other ideas include leveraging the high speed ICE (Inner City Express) trains that Germany is famous for to link the airport to all of the surrounding routes. The plan would include several new tunnels, and rack up a cost of about $2.6 billion. So for the time being, we continue to sit in our cars and battle through the highway 9 construction.