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Kusel District is located in the south of Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, and is neighbouring with, from north-west clockwise, Birkenfeld, Bad Kreuznach, Donnersbergkreis, Kaiserslautern, Saarpfalz and Sankt Wendel (the last two belonging to the state of Saarland). The District of Kusel has a size of 573.42 km2 and is 338 m above sea-level. The District of Kusel has hilly and rural landscape and is spatially close to France and Luxembourg. It is composed by 98 municipalities with a total population of 69 949 in 2021.The capital is Kusel and the main centers are Schönenberg-Kübelberg, Waldmohr, Lauterecken and Wolfstein. The district is responsible for local public transport, meanwhile the local municipality is primarily responsible for the tourism sector. In particular, the area where is implemented the studied mobility solutions is the Oberes Glantal Association: an administrative unit in the Kusel district. It was created on January 1, 2017 from the voluntary union of the municipalities Glan-Münchweiler, Schönenberg-Kübelberg and Waldmohr.
Schönenberg-Kübelberg (~ 5,7k inhab.) is the largest municipality in the Kusel district. Due to its centrality, it offers facilities for day care, education, traffic and administrative issues, as well as opportunities for leisure, sport and culture. It is an important hub in the public transport network for its central bus station (123 bus connections daily). The municipality of Glan-Münchweiler (~ 1,2 inhab.) has a train station with a connection to the Rhineland-Palatinate train service, a bus station and a direct access to the A 62 motorway (Pirmasens-Trier). Waldmohr (~ 5,2k inhab.) has a direct connection to the A6 Mannheim – Saarbrücken motorway. Concerning the tourism sector, Schönenberg-Kübelberg has an important tourist facility in the Ohmbachsee, that is supplemented by the Ritter-Gerin-Weg and the Kübelberg cultural center. In Glan-Münchweiler and Waldmohr territories there are different cycle paths where tourists can do bike tours or some hikes. In thematically sorted museums there is information about the diamond cutting industry, the miners’ farmers, the history of the emigrants and the Jewish community.
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Key characteristics
The district of Kusel has one of the highest car-density per inhabitant in the whole of Germany. One of the main mobility challenges in the district of Kusel is to make a mobility offer to people who haven’t or no longer have a car yet. While the larger towns have connections every hour, many small towns are off the beaten track. Fixed routes with large buses are sensibly supplemented by the Ruftaxi, an on-demand service; however, for many people, especially the elderly and people with limited mobility, the stops are often difficult to reach due to the distance and the hilly landscape. Moreover, public transport services are still limited or no longer available at all during the weekend. The lack of an adequate and integrated public transport service provision, which makes it difficult for the local inhabitants and tourists to use public transport on their daily trips, increases the car dependency and the need to have 2 or more cars into a single family. Another big challenge for public mobility services in the district of Kusel is the approval among the population. Indeed, public transport was perceived as expensive and cumbersome. The situation changed with the creation of an understandable fare and price structure, the new “Deutschlandticket”. In order to achieve an improvement in everyday life, the citizens’ buses run two days a week to the main facilities in the urban centre – as health centres, shops, bank, leisure centres, etc.
Concerning the tourism issues, the difficulty on the implementation of mobility solutions in rural areas obliges the tourists to use the private or rental car to visit the hinterland. For this reason, one of the tourism challenges is the improvement of the connection inside all the region expanding the tourism. In addition, the situation of the catering and hospitality industries is problematic due to staff shortages and the covid-19 period.
Bürgerbus is a volunteer-based community transport service (DRT) with flexible path; this means that the buses pick-up the passengers at their house and leave them to the desired location (door-to-door scheme).
The service was tested the 6th July 2017 and it started to be operational from August 14, 2017. The idea behind the citizen bus was to transfer people among the 23 local communities of Oberes Glantal, improving the accessibility of the population living in rural and semi-rural areas through the integration of conventional public transport services with sustainable ones. In addition, the supply of the service aspires to reduce the car dependency and the need to have 2 or more cars into a single family. It allows to increase mobility opportunities, improve shared mobility and contribute to social inclusion. The service is available to all rural households, especially to vulnerable users such as elderly and people with reduced mobility. Considering the wide area covered by the service, Bürgerbus benefits also a range of other target groups including youngsters and families with children. The mobility service is provided via two small buses with a maximum capacity of 8 passengers. The service is free of charge and is operative every Tuesday and Thursday from 8:00 am to 6:00 pm. To access the Bürgerbus service the user must pre-order a ride by phone or email.
In July 2022, the Bürgerbus service counted on 50 volunteers, 40,000 km driven per year, almost 500 passengers registered to the service, and 50-80 passengers per day.
The Smart Bank are seats with a photovoltaic power supply utilized for the recharge of smartphones. In the area is present also a free Wi-Fi and a QR codes that provide access to information on tourism, mobility and local amenities. This gives the opportunity to the tourists to recharge their telephones in a sustainable way, and be informed on cultural, natural and historic heritage near them at the same time. In addition, they have also mobility information for the movement in the Kusel territory. In the Verbandsgemeinde of Oberes Glantal there is already a “clever bank”; 12 more are currently being planned.
Bürgerbus Oberes Glantal
Bürgerbus is a volunteer-based community transport service (DRT) with flexible path; this means that the buses pick-up the passengers at their house and leave them to the desired location (door-to-door scheme).
The service was tested the 6th July 2017 and it started to be operational from August 14, 2017. The idea behind the citizen bus was to transfer people among the 23 local communities of Oberes Glantal, improving the accessibility of the population living in rural and semi-rural areas through the integration of conventional public transport services with sustainable ones. In addition, the supply of the service aspires to reduce the car dependency and the need to have 2 or more cars into a single family. It allows to increase mobility opportunities, improve shared mobility and contribute to social inclusion. The service is available to all rural households, especially to vulnerable users such as elderly and people with reduced mobility. Considering the wide area covered by the service, Bürgerbus benefits also a range of other target groups including youngsters and families with children. The mobility service is provided via two small buses with a maximum capacity of 8 passengers. The service is free of charge and is operative every Tuesday and Thursday from 8:00 am to 6:00 pm. To access the Bürgerbus service the user must pre-order a ride by phone or email.
In July 2022, the Bürgerbus service counted on 50 volunteers, 40,000 km driven per year, almost 500 passengers registered to the service, and 50-80 passengers per day.
Smart bench – die schlaue Bank
The Smart Bank are seats with a photovoltaic power supply utilized for the recharge of smartphones. In the area is present also a free Wi-Fi and a QR codes that provide access to information on tourism, mobility and local amenities. This gives the opportunity to the tourists to recharge their telephones in a sustainable way, and be informed on cultural, natural and historic heritage near them at the same time. In addition, they have also mobility information for the movement in the Kusel territory. In the Verbandsgemeinde of Oberes Glantal there is already a “clever bank”; 12 more are currently being planned.
Bürgerbus Oberes Glantal:
Contact: Mr. Karl-Heinz Schoon: info@khschoon.de
