Finally build the subway to the airport, Berlin needs it

By Gunnar Schupelius

The CDU-SPD Senate is making good on an election promise and is planning to extend subway lines. At the top of the agenda is the U 7 from Rudow to BER. But anyone who thought that the plans would now be on the table so that construction could begin was wrong. It is now being examined whether this extension is needed at all.

The Senate Department for Mobility, Transport, Climate Protection and the Environment (SenMVKU) reports: “SenMVKU will take over the project management for the upcoming call for tenders and the preparation of the economic feasibility study. The result of the economic feasibility study is the basis for the decision on further planning steps.” In plain English this means: The Senate directs the tender so that an external company can check whether the further construction of the U 7 is worthwhile.

But that’s exactly what the sparrows are whistling from the rooftops: The Rudower spider was already overloaded before the opening of BER. It’s about connecting Neukölln to the airport. Buses are not enough for this, because Neukölln is a big city. For 20 years, the district has been asking for the construction of the U7 to continue and now there is “the preparation of the economic feasibility study”.

You see it again: The bureaucracy is holding up the whole shop. The subway construction is financially supported by the federal government. For this, an “economic feasibility study” must be submitted, explains the Senator for Mobility, Transport, Climate Protection and the Environment, Manja Schreiner (CDU). Really? Isn’t it faster?

Nothing is more obvious than the need for a subway connection to the airport. For this purpose, a route has been kept free on the Berlin side for decades, it leads next to Waltersdorfer Chaussee via Lieselotte-Berger-Platz to the airport. The line could partly be built more cheaply here than an open route. A “feasibility study” by the BVG from 2020 “confirmed the operational feasibility”, as it is said.

The BVG has long since provided evidence of the importance of expanding the subway and is demanding that the network be expanded from the current 150 to 371 kilometers. This includes, for example, the extension of the U3 line from Krumme Lanke to Klein Machnow, the U9 to Marienfelde, the U6 to Lichtenrade, the U7 to the airport, the U8 to the Märkisches Viertel, the U1 to Heerstraße in the west and to Antonplatz in the Northeast – and the extension of the U 7 to the airport.