Rail ticketing

Key points

The EESC:

• calls for a single, interoperable European rail ticketing framework to overcome fragmentation and enable seamless travel across operators and borders;
• calls for safeguards against dominant digital platforms, including excessive commissions, discriminatory rankings and algorithmic self-preferencing;
• recommends a European “fair value-sharing” principle, ensuring that ticketing revenues contribute fairly to the European rail ecosystem, sustainable services and investment;
• stresses that digitalisation must not exclude passengers, ensuring accessible non-digital ticketing, equal online/offline pricing and coverage of rural and peripheral regions;
• recommends EU-level rail ticketing governance, involving operators, infrastructure managers, ticket vendors, consumers, passengers, SMEs and social partners, with strong cybersecurity and regular “reality checks.”