A recent study finds that a majority of Swiss see a future beyond car ownership. This new post-car world, set out by a team of geographers, architects, urbanists, economists, engineers, and political and social scientists, asked the public to imagine living in a society that would choose to live car free, not out of environmental constraints […]
Unlicensed teenage speeder breaks record
A teenager without a license, driving way too fast, will be among the last to arrive when it comes to eventually getting his drivers license. On 20 September, a 16-year-old boy was flashed at 158 km/hr in a 60 km/hr construction zone on the A9 highway outside Lausanne, according to Vaud Police. The construction zone, […]
Swiss police issue WhatsApp message fine
20 Minutes. After noticing a roadside police check, a resident of the canton of St Gallen sent a message to a WhatsApp group warning of the check. Not long after he received a nasty surprise. Speaking to the newspaper 20 Minuten, the man said: “Me and several others received a penalty notice this week. I […]
No more free lunchtime parking in central Lausanne
24 Heures. In the centre of Lausanne it is no longer possible to park from free between 12:30 and 13:30. The zone stretches from the city to the main train station and from Chauderon to Parc Mon-Repos. The area covers around 1,600 parks. While difficult to estimate, the city expects to collect an extra few hundred […]
Super high-speed train between Zurich and Milan unveiled
20 Minutes. Dubbed the “Superveloce”, the new high-speed journey is expected to start operating between now and 2020. Made possible by the opening of the new Gotthard train tunnel, the trip should take only 2 hours and 45 minutes. Since the world’s longest train tunnel was opened in December 2016, 2.3 million passengers have passed through […]
Avoiding long queues at Gotthard tunnel
20 Minutes. According to TCS (Touring Club Suisse), a queue of 10 km was reported on the northern side of the Gotthard road tunnel on Friday 14 July. Some waited 1 hour and 40 minutes. On the southern side of the tunnel queues stretched 3 km, leaving motorists waiting around 45 minutes. The long queue […]
Swiss Rail boss says ticket prices should stay stable
20 Minutes. Andreas Meyer, the head of Swiss Rail, told the newspaper Le Matin Dimanche that Swiss Rail ticket prices should remain stable in the future. He said prices could even go down in order to compete with road travel. “Car makers want to make road journeys cheaper…. This is why we are working to […]
Volkswagen to recall 22,000 of its cars in Switzerland
20 Minutes. The newspaper 20 Minutes reported that around 22,000 Volkswagen cars in Switzerland are to be recalled because their ABS brake system does not function correctly. On Wednesday, blick.ch published a statement made by Dino Graf, a spokesperson for Amag, a Swiss car importer, that confirms the manufacturer’s recall plan. Swiss VW owners will be […]
Swiss driverless buses a hit despite accident
By Peter Hulm Sion’s driverless public shuttle buses celebrated their first anniversary of experimental operation in the mainly pedestrian precincts of the Valais capital on 23 June 2017. Switzerland’s PostAuto/PostBus, responsible for the 11-seater yellow electric vehicles built by the French company Navya, said the two SmartShuttles carried more than 21,500 people through the Sion […]
Swiss road tax vignettes set to become electronic
Switzerland’s federal council, or executive branch of government, has made further progress on coming up with an electronic replacement for the nation’s motorway tax sticker, or vignette. It released a report last week with details that bring its plans closer to reality. The sticker, which costs CHF 40 a year and was introduced in 1985, is […]
