After the term "transport planning" had long been regarded as an unbreakable guiding principle of transport policy alternatives, (neo)liberal criticism of the state also took hold there. Since the early 1990s, there has been broad consensus in parliamentary circles that the former largest employer in the Federal Republic must be freed from "the shackles of public service and budget law" and led to where market mechanisms have the most effective and often disastrous impact: the stock exchange. Compelling arguments against the shifts towards the capital market received little attention. The withdrawal from the regional level, the thinning out of train schedules, the abolition of InterRegio, the opaque fare structure, and the extensive sale of train stations - all of these are negative aspects of the railway reform that has been ongoing for a decade and a half, which has led to numerous issues.