As Germany mulls over the option of making public transportation free, it’s worth taking a look at towns across the globe that have already done so. Craig Morris investigates. In my previous post, I mentioned that Freiburg, Germany, does not allow bicycles to be taken along on trams and buses. Other cities do, such as Toronto – at least outside of rush hours. Melbourne, Australia, has a free tram zone in the city center. But a number of cities worldwide offer free transport everywhere, as this list shows. That list doesn’t include any cities in Germany, but there were at least two: Lübben (an hour south of Berlin) and Templin (an hour north of Berlin). Back in the late 1990s, the number of passengers rose eightfold in Templin and fourfold in Lübben when the projects were rolled out (in German). Four years later, the number of passengers had risen 15 fold in Templin (in German). But both towns are quite small (Lübben has a population of 14,000), and the alternative to free transport was closing … Continue reading Free public transport: best practices worldwide