The Greens and the Left criticize the federal government’s handling of the extreme low water levels on Germany’s rivers. While the Greens are divided on the planned easing of the Sunday and holiday driving ban for trucks, the Left rejects the measure. Instead, it calls for more support for inland navigation and additional rail capacity.
“Right on time for summer, the federal government is trying to tinker with the symptoms,” Lisa Badum, the climate policy spokesperson for the Greens’ parliamentary group, told the Tagesspiegel. “Sending even more trucks onto the roads is wrong.” Instead, year-round measures against the consequences of the climate crisis are needed. “We need intact rivers as a priority and a heat-proof railway,” Badum said.
Andreas Audretsch, deputy parliamentary group leader of the Greens, however, considers exceptions to the driving ban to be understandable. “The fact that such measures are necessary to avoid supply bottlenecks shows that the damage of the climate crisis to the economy is already enormous,” he told the Tagesspiegel. At the same time, he accused Friedrich Merz (CDU) of ignoring the consequences of the crisis.
The Green-led transport ministry in North Rhine-Westphalia had temporarily eased the Sunday and holiday driving ban for trucks on Friday. During the summer holidays, trucks will also be allowed to drive on Saturdays there. This was to maintain supply chains and avoid supply bottlenecks, said NRW Transport Minister Oliver Krischer (Greens). Rhineland-Palatinate, Saarland, and Lower Saxony have also temporarily lifted the driving ban for certain trucks on Sundays and holidays.
The Left rejects the easing. Party leader Luigi Pantisano criticized that the federal government is reacting “far too late” to the dramatic low water levels. The Union is using the crisis as a pretext to weaken the Sunday driving ban, he said. “In the end, truck drivers are supposed to pay for the government’s failures and give up their well-deserved Sunday.”
Instead of sending more trucks onto the roads, affected inland waterway carriers should be supported and additional rail capacity created at short notice, Pantisano demanded. More trucks would mean more traffic jams, noise, and exhaust fumes.
Federal Transport Minister Steffen Bilger (CDU) had announced several immediate measures on Thursday after a low-water conference with companies and associations in Bonn. These include, in addition to possible exceptions to the Sunday and holiday driving ban, fewer disruptions from avoidable construction sites and additional capacity for freight transport on the rail. In the medium and long term, waterways are to be expanded and ships adapted to low water levels.
The Left also presented a five-point plan for dealing with the water crisis. In it, it calls for, among other things, the creation of sponge
Source: www.tagesspiegel.de
