The Consumer Choice Center has published its European Railway Station Index 2020, revealing Europe’s most passenger-friendly railway stations.
The maximum score a station could receive was 139, gaining points in different categories. The overall winner was London St Pancras with a score of 116. Zurich Central Station and Leipzig Central Station came second and third respectively. Of the top ten stations in this ranking, five were in Germany, making it the most successful country in the index. Of the top ten stations, seven are northern European, two are southern European (Roma Termini and Milano Centrale) and one is eastern European (Moscow).
European Railway Station Index 2020 Winners
The top 10 stations are:
- London St Pancras
- Zurich Central Station
- Leipzig Central Station
- Roma Termini
- Munich Central Station
- Hamburg Central Station
- Berlin Central Station
- Milan Central Station
- Moscow Kazansky
- Frankfurt Central Station
European Railway Station Index 2020 Categories
To create the index, the Consumer Choice Center looked at Europe’s 50 largest railways stations and ranked them in terms of passenger experience. The categories in which stations could gain points were:
- annual passengers / number of platforms
- number of domestic destinations
- number of international destinations
- lounges
- ride-sharing
- elevators
- accessibility
- shopping experience
- dining experience
- cleanliness
- competition
- signage / orientation
- strike days
Category Winners
Of the top ten, Leipzig performed best in the passengers per platform and domestic destinations (51) categories.
Munich Central Station offers the greatest number of international destinations (14).
All of the stations in the top ten have wheelchair accessibility and all bar Moscow have elevators to platforms.
Zurich Central Station has the most amount of shops as well as the most amount of restaurants.
The two Italian stations both have two first-class lounges, while all the remaining stations in the top 10 have one, with the exception of Leipzig, which does not have a lounge.
On the cleanliness front, Milan Central Station was the only one in the top 10 to not receive full marks (5). It got 4 points for 80 percent cleanliness. However, Milan was the winner with regards to competition, with 5 railway companies using the station. Milan didn’t just place first in the top 10 here but first among all 50 stations. Leipzig, Munich, Hamburg, Berlin and Frankfurt – i.e. all the German stations in the top 10 – got 0 points in this category, with only one railway company serving these stations.
Milan and Rome both got 0 points in the strike days category, both having 88 strike days. Zurich meanwhile had only 1 strike day.
Additional Findings
For the UK, Italy, Russia, France, Austria, Finland, Norway and Denmark the best-performing station was in the capital. For Switzerland, Germany, the Netherlands and Spain this was not the case.
The only UK station to make it into the 50 biggest that was not in London was Birmingham. Six of the 50 stations were in London. All of the stations in France on the list were in Paris – a total of 7 stations.
Magenta Station in Paris was the worst-performing of the 50 stations examined, achieving a total score of 41.
Gare Montparnasse (Paris) has the most domestic destinations (65) of the 50 stations.
London Euston and Roma Tiburtina are the only 2 stations on the list that have zero wheelchair accessibility.
“Our efforts to make stations attractive to our customers have paid off. But we're not resting on our laurels: over the next five years we'll be investing 7.5 billion euros – with the help of federal funding – in our stations, in order to be an even better host to our passengers in big and small stations.”
Just yesterday Deutsche Bahn announced it would make 300 coworking spaces available in Berlin Central Station to help passengers use their time at the station in a pleasant and productive manner. Customers will be able to hire spaces for just a few minutes, full days or long-term. The programme, branded ‘everyworks’ will start in March and is one DB intends to expand to other locations.
