Rail travel Swiss people will travel more by train in 2023

In no other European country did people travel as much by rail last year as in Switzerland. In 2023, the Swiss traveled an average of 2466 passenger-kilometres by rail.

This corresponds to an increase of 13.2 percent compared to the previous year, as Litra, the information service for public transport, announced on Thursday. However, Switzerland has not yet reached the peak value of 2019 with 2505 passenger kilometers per capita.

Austria takes second place in the statistics with a per capita performance of 1576 passenger-kilometers, followed by France with 1481 passenger-kilometers. Switzerland's other neighboring countries appear further down in the statistics: Germany is in fifth place with 1215 kilometers and Italy in eighth place with 929 kilometers per capita. Greece brings up the rear with 65 kilometers.

More rail journeys

In addition to the number of passenger kilometers traveled, the number of train journeys also increased in Switzerland last year. On average, residents traveled 68 times by train in 2023. This is an increase of 11.5 percent compared to the previous year.

With 43 rail journeys per capita, Luxembourg ranks second ahead of Austria with 36. Neighbouring countries Germany, France and Italy rank fifth, ninth and 13th with 33, 18 and 14 journeys respectively. Greece is once again at the bottom of the statistics - with one rail journey per person.

According to Litra, the comparison includes the 25 EU countries with rail transport as well as the UK, Norway and Switzerland. Data for Poland, Belgium and the Netherlands is missing for rail journeys per person.

SDA