I’d like to share my experiences growing up in the Frankfurt area as the center of the Rhein-Main Verkehrsverbund (RMV, think: Transport for London, but for the Frankurt and Rhine-Main Area):
- Rail transit (heavy rail only, like Regional Express, Regionalbahn or S-Bahn) are the responsibilities of the States, which are funding them through transit networks. In the case of Hessen, that is the Nordhessischer Verkehrsverbund (NVV) in the Kassel Area, the Verkehrsverbund Rhein-Neckar (VRN) in its most southern county, whereas the RMV covers the vast bulk of its territory and population.
- Regional bus lines are also organized by the RMV.
- Urban and local bus lines or urban rail transit (like trams or subways) are organized by “local transit organizations”, which are sub-organizations of the RMV.
Note that “organized” does not mean the same as “operated”: The RMV does progressively tender out more and more rail or bus services, as required by EU directives, i.e. it’s moving away from the TTC model to the GO model (where rail operations have been tendered and contracted out to ONxpress).
In terms of fares, the same fares are applied to all types of transit, which have zones and are thus somewhat proportional to distance, a bit like GO’s price structure, just that they apply to all networks and operators. However, this is mostly meaningless in times where the “Deutschlandticket” provides a nationwide flatrate for 58 Euros (C$90).
The key point here is that the RMV collects all fares and distributes them (together with operational subsidies) to its local transit organizations, so that they can fund and expand their services. Thanks to the PRESTO card and the ridership data it automatically generates, this process would be much simpler in Ontario than for the RMV…
