Campuscard on the sidings - Dresden public transport companies rely on smartphone obligation
Press Release of the StuRa (Student Council)
With the start of the summer semester on April 1, 2024, students at TUD Dresden University of Technology will be able to use their semester ticket nationwide. However, the Student Council (StuRa), which concludes the contracts for the semester ticket with the transport companies, has mixed feelings about the obligation to purchase a cell phone ticket.
The introduction of the German semester ticket is seen by many students as significant progress. However, the technical implementation by the Verkehrsverbund Oberelbe (VVO) and Dresdner Verkehrsbetriebe (DVB) as a smartphone ticket solution has not only met with approval and leads to problems in students' everyday lives. For example, not all students have a smartphone. In addition, the conversion of the semester ticket to smartphone tickets requires that all students always have a sufficiently charged cell phone with them.
On request to the Student Council, DVB also offers a fee-based solution for students without a smartphone. However, this is not equivalent to the smartphone ticket, neither in terms of effort nor in terms of the individual costs for those affected. The new regulation is causing considerable uncertainty, particularly in light of the recent introduction of the new student ID card (Campuscard), which combines a canteen and library card as well as a semester ticket in one chip card.
As part of a cooperation agreement between the university, the StuRa and DVB AG, as well as other cooperation partners, a student ID card was introduced in the summer semester of 2023 after years of preparation, which meets the eTicket standard of the Association of German Transport Companies (VDV), which is also used for DVB's tickets, for example. In principle, these student ID cards also meet the technical requirements of the Deutschlandticket, but adjustments are necessary for nationwide use.
Due to the short notice of the introduction, the student representatives and the transport companies had jointly agreed to primarily rely on a smartphone solution for the summer semester 2024. However, the aim was to discuss technical adjustments to the Campuscard for the following semesters. On this point, however, Dresden's public transport company has now unilaterally created facts.
As the student representatives were recently informed, DVB withdrew from the cooperation agreement to implement a semester ticket on the Campuscard at the end of March without prior notice. This means that the Technical University is now no longer able to issue chip cards with semester ticket entitlement.
"We note with great surprise that DVB wants to say goodbye to a newly digitized chip card system. With this unilateral step, the Campuscard as a medium for the semester ticket is dead as things stand. The question arises as to whether it is only us students who are to be treated worse than all other customers, or whether the days of DVB chip cards are also numbered for other subscription customers," says Nikodim Brickwell, Advisor Mobility of the TU Dresden Student Council.
From January 1, 2025, the tariff regulations for the Deutschlandticket will require that not only the first and last name, but also the date of birth are digitally stored on the chip cards. As things stand at present, however, the chip cards issued by DVB do not contain these features, meaning that they would have to be exchanged for all existing customers with a Deutschlandticket by January 2025. According to the student negotiating team, it is questionable whether DVB is prepared to exchange all chip cards or whether it would like to switch to a smartphone ticket solution.
"While other transport companies are successfully attracting students as reliable customers through attractive local arrangements, such as taking bicycles with them in Leipzig, Dresden's transport companies seem to be working against this trend. As a result, we are hearing ever louder calls for alternative options to be considered," explains Cao Son Ta from the TU Dresden Student Council's Mobility Department.
Background information: The Student Council of the TUD Dresden University of Technology (StuRa TU Dresden) represents the approximately 30,000 students at TU Dresden as a legally established student representative body. The StuRa's mobility department is responsible for the semester ticket, among other things, and negotiates this on behalf of the students. TU Dresden students collectively pay around 8.5 million euros per year as part of the semester ticket and thus make a significant contribution to financing Dresden's public transport system. For the opportunity to use the MOBIbike system, students pay an additional 300,000 euros per year to DVB.