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Transportation Earth Government The Almighty Buck

Luxembourg To Become First Country To Make All Public Transport Free (theguardian.com) 215

Posted by BeauHD from the first-of-its-kind dept.
An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Luxembourg is set to become the first country in the world to make all its public transport free. Fares on trains, trams and buses will be lifted next summer under the plans of the re-elected coalition government led by Xavier Bettel, who was sworn in for a second term as prime minister on Wednesday. Luxembourg City, the capital of the small Grand Duchy, suffers from some of the worst traffic congestion in the world. It is home to about 110,000 people, but a further 400,000 commute into the city to work. A study suggested that drivers in the capital spent an average of 33 hours in traffic jams in 2016. While the country as a whole has 600,000 inhabitants, nearly 200,000 people living in France, Belgium and Germany cross the border every day to work in Luxembourg.

Luxembourg has increasingly shown a progressive attitude to transport. This summer, the government brought in free transport for every child and young person under the age of 20. Secondary school students can use free shuttles between their institution and their home. Commuters need only pay about $2.27 for up to two hours of travel, which in a country of just 999 sq miles (2,590 sq km) covers almost all journeys. Now, from the start of 2020 all tickets will be abolished, saving on the collection of fares and the policing of ticket purchases. The policy is yet to be fully thought through, however. A decision has yet to be taken on what to do about first- and second-class compartments on trains.
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Luxembourg To Become First Country To Make All Public Transport Free More

Luxembourg To Become First Country To Make All Public Transport Free

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  • Good question (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Kokuyo ( 549451 ) on Friday December 07, 2018 @09:05AM (#57765052) Journal

    If you go for something like 5 bucks a day gets you 1st class, you'll once again need policing, clearly defeating some of the point.

    If you do it on a first come, first serve basis, I guarantee it won't take one week for the first physical encounters to happen over a 1st class seat...

    • You might want some form of policing anyway. Some people (especially older ones) have complained before about having far fewer conductors on trains and trams these days. They are useful for keeping unruly passengers in line, provide directions, etc.

      • "You might want some form of policing anyway. "

        There are security people who ride along most trains anyway, on top of the ticket vendors controllers in the trains.

        • there are security people who ride along most trains anyway

          Will there still be as many in a system no longer generating revenue? I'm suspicious of how the end game looks here.

          I was always fine with the system where people with money paid for public transit, and people without skipped paying fares. That seems to work pretty well most places, and it brought in a lot of revenue for public transit specifically.

          • A big problem with "free" services, is that the user is no longer a paying customer, the provider loses nothing from a decline in ridership, and has little incentive to care about quality.

            Nevertheless, this will likely work fine in Luxembourg. It is small, affluent, socially-cohesive, and a high-trust society. But their success will not translate to Detroit.

    • mKaart (a smartcard) works on the train, tram, bus and self-service bicycles

      young people (20 to 25) can get free travel now apart from travel to the international terminals

      honestly I don't know why more places don't do this, sure charge visitors and if you want 1st class charge for it but ordinary TAXPAYERS who dont need to have an entire car then are not clogging up the roads... makes everyone happier

      • Re: mKaart (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Luckyo ( 1726890 ) on Friday December 07, 2018 @10:11AM (#57765344)

        Because TAXPAYERS in Luxembourg overwhelmingly people of the rest of EU, rather than its own citizens. Their primary means of income is providing safe haven for tax evasion for large companies that want an office within EU and all the perks that come with it.

        There's a reason why the current head of EU Commission and former PM of Luxembourg has earned himself a nickname "tax evader in chief". It's easy to pay for large array of benefits to a microstate worth of people when you can fund it via providing safe haven for large multinationals.

        If you're an actually productive rather than parasitic economy, the picture looks very different and perks like these don't scale well.

        • Re: mKaart (Score:4, Interesting)

          by LynnwoodRooster ( 966895 ) on Friday December 07, 2018 @11:07AM (#57765642) Journal
          How many transit systems actually operate at a profit? In most of the US, transit systems operate at significant losses, with something like 70-80% of the costs covered by general taxes, not the ticket. And the transit is often-times under-utilized. Moving to a free model may just fill up the transit systems, for not a whole lot more tax dollars.

          • Re: mKaart (Score:4, Interesting)

            by Luckyo ( 1726890 ) on Friday December 07, 2018 @11:52AM (#57765878)

            In my home city of Tampere, we have one of the cheapest tickets in Finland for a city of its size. Additionally city's population density is so low, that when we joined the EU, it was classified as a "village of ~200.000 people" by EU standards. Additionally our central street that most bus lines use is a historic street made of stone pavement, which causes excessive vibration on the bus structures over time requiring additional maintenance and making buses that operate on gaseous fuel impossible as valves cannot handle vibration for long. That kind of population spread coupled with unique problem of pavement on the central street makes public transit a significant challenge, so being one of the cheapest in terms of ticket prices in the country has been one of the point of pride to the folks doing the planning in the organisation. I listened to a couple of lectures on the topic in my old university some years ago.

            To my understanding, the public company that handles the public transit lines is profitable and highly competitive with private bus companies. Latest city budget proposal for 2019 reports that it was profitable to the tune of 3,6 million Euro on the revenue of slightly under 28 million revenue in the latest numbers they have which is for year 2017. Revenue includes 2,1 million "support and assistance from the region".

            Here's the document I took the numbers from:
            https://www.tampere.fi/tiedost... [tampere.fi]

            Page 115 has the numbers First column is the final numbers for 2017, to which plans for 2018-2022 are contrasted. You can find what individual lines mean by running the document through google translate.

            • I don't know if it's still there, but there used to be a bus that ran on a cobbled street in Brussels - near the royal palace & the park.

              Damage to the valves I was the least of my worries.

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

                We're installing a tramway over next few years in that street, and there was a big news story on the fact that there's only one specialist in the entire country who knows how to remake that stone cobbled road back after it's removed so rails can be installed.

                It's a part of history of the city. As such, it's valuable. Apparently it will take something like 4-5 years for that one guy to rebuild the road with his team, stone by stone. And he'll be doing it.

          • I know the local public transit where I am is required to be self sufficient. meaning that they can't run a deficit with their income being from a local sales tax, fares, advertising, and whatever federal or state money they get. this has led to a semi perpetual downward spiral where ridership declines, so the cut routes, which erodes public confidence they can get where they need to go and back in a reasonable time, which causes ridership to decline...
            • Precisely. I never understood a "nuisance tax" called a fare, when the fare covers a small portion of costs and also serves to restrict use. Make transit free, eat the remaining 10-20% of costs, and see if ridership increases.

        • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

          by Anonymous Coward

          If you're an actually productive rather than parasitic economy, the picture looks very different and perks like these don't scale well.

          If you're a productive economy then those workers are commuting to a place of work which then produces goods/services which contributes to GDP. You then tax those companies and their sales/trade. Those tax receipts should be sufficient to pay for the employee's transport costs, given that it's affordable out of their salary which is paid from a small part of their revenue. It should result in people using public transport more. Companies should benefit from more employees in their talent pool and the govern

          • Re: (Score:2)

            by Luckyo ( 1726890 )

            These grandiose utopian plans tend to crash and burn when you go into details, specifically because they're utopian. You still want people to pay for the ride, if for no other reason than to make them value having it.

            General goal in European major cities is that you get costs low enough that its a good and popular alternative, but high enough so people don't treat it like they treat all free things. With zero considerations.

            And if you do it like that, it can work even in fairly low population density areas.

        • instead of a 'perk'. You do need to build your cities around it though, which most European cities did. The problem with America is that our car companies got to decide how our cities would be laid out in the 30s, 40s and 50s.

          • You do need to build your cities around it though, which most European cities did.

            With a few exceptions, European cities were already old when horses were invented, let alone buses, trams & underground railways.

            Some of them did get an extensive makeover in the early 1950s, though.

      • "young people (20 to 25) can get free travel "

        People under 20 are completely free since last year, 20-25 ride for free to their respective schools.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by MrMr ( 219533 )
        The average citizen in Luxemburg receives a net contribution of 2600 Euro from the EU. That is all paid by ordinary taxpayers outside Luxemburg. I do know why more places don't do this - they are to busy funding your happy duchy where everything is free.

    • Re:Good question (Score:5, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 07, 2018 @10:00AM (#57765294)

      I've grown up here in Luxembourg. For there to be any kind of physical alteration between adults is extremely rare. As for kids, they might get a bit rowdy from time to time but not much more than that. A lot of that has to do with the place being so small that if you do start a scrap, somebody will know who you are and the cops will come knocking.

      The difference between between 1st and 2nd class is a matter of compartment and seat colour. The rest, including the comfort of the seats, is exactly the same. The only reason why you'd buy a 1st class ticket is so you're guaranteed a seat and it's only applicable on trains as all bus transport is one class.

    • Given that the country is 87km long and 57 km wide why on earth would you even need first class? You will not be sitting in it for longer than about 30 minutes unless you are crossing a border in which case the travel is no longer free anyway.

      • You will not be sitting in it for longer than about 30 minutes unless you are crossing a border

        You'd wish. From Troisvierges to Belval (no borders involved) the train takes 1 hour 45 minutes. If it is on time, which rarely happens.

        Yes, some people actually object to fare-free travel saying that the money would be better used improving the service, rather than making it cheaper.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by dryeo ( 100693 )

        As mentioned above, 1st class includes reserving a seat and not much else. (different coloured seats basically)

    • Re:Good question (Score:5, Interesting)

      by nospam007 ( 722110 ) * on Friday December 07, 2018 @10:20AM (#57765392)

      "If you do it on a first come, first serve basis, I guarantee it won't take one week for the first physical encounters to happen over a 1st class seat..."

      Indeed. Disclaimer: I'm from Luxembourg and I worked as a railway dispatcher for 40 years.

      1. Class (+25€ per month) is used by people who want to get seated in overcrowded commuter trains where half the people are standing. The rest is occupied by railway workers from middle management upwards, because they can use that one for free, just like the rest uses 2. class for free.
      Also, train ticket controllers and sellers earn between 60.000 and 80.000€ a year, (not to mention QA, Finance and other top jobs who earn much more) so if those jobs are not needed anymore, just as all the expensive electronic ticketing, the vending machines and their IT, the 'free' part doesn't cost much in the end.

      Also bus drivers won't be attacked for the money if there isn't any anymore.

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
    • Wow an average of 8 minutes per day for a 250 day work year. That must be brutal. Europeans are so spoiled.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Kidbro ( 80868 )

      In DC the corresponding number is 63, in Atlanta it's 70 and in LA it's 102. LA tops the list world wide, btw.

      This information is two clicks away from the summary: http://inrix.com/scorecard/ [inrix.com]

      That wasn't so hard, was it?

  • It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded... (Score:3, Informative)

    by bobbied ( 2522392 ) on Friday December 07, 2018 @09:16AM (#57765104)

    You may not be paying for it when you use it, but it's being paid for though taxation. It's not free, far from it.

    But let's be real. "Public transportation" is ALWAYS taxpayer funded in some way. Why? Because there is no way it would be possible for the private sector to do this kind of thing at a "reasonable" cost for the average user. The business model is unworkable. The only option is to throw taxpayer funds into it.

    • Re:It's not Free... It is taxpayer funded... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Friday December 07, 2018 @09:42AM (#57765208) Homepage Journal

      Even if you don't use public transport it benefits you by reducing traffic.

      • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

        by ledow ( 319597 )

        And means you don't have to buy a car yourself.

        And reduces pollution.

        And means people can get to your businesses without having to pay for fuel and parking.

        And means that when your car breaks down you can still get to work without having to worry about it.

        The point of things like mass transit is that you SPEND MONEY on them as a basic service that everyone is able to use, in order that you save lots of money elsewhere.

        It's in a country's best interests to ensure that workers can get to work, reliably, on-ti

        • Same way that my council collects my rubbish "for free" because if you charged me specifically to take my rubbish away, all those people who can't afford things will sacrifice rubbish collection and

          Somebody, please tell this the Luxembourgish communal authorities... Have you ever seen garbage cans with locks on them? Surprise: in Esch-sur-Alzette you have them! No, it's not to prevent people from stealing your garbage, but rather to prevent them from adding to it.

          turn all the poor areas of the city into unofficial municipal rubbish tips in seconds.

          ... or of the neighboring cities. Wonder why there are no public garbage cans left at the rest areas in Dippach?

          Right: it's to prevent people driving through from Esch-sur-Alzette to Luxembourg-City on their way to work to dump their househo

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Kjella ( 173770 )

          Same way that my council collects my rubbish "for free" because if you charged me specifically to take my rubbish away, all those people who can't afford things will sacrifice rubbish collection and turn all the poor areas of the city into unofficial municipal rubbish tips in seconds.

          I don't know about you but I get an itemized bill of all county services, including hot and cold water, sewage, garbage collection etc. but I don't know if it's actually optional. I assume that if you did try they'd require documentation that you actually have an alternate waste disposal system in compliance with everything. The rest is quite obvious, if you have well water you don't pay for water and if you have a septic tank you don't pay for public sewage. You usually pay more to maintain your own system

      • It's not just that. I think a city needs a whole range of salary levels to stay well oiled. Eventually, it is constrained by becoming unaffordable to low salary, low value positions. You can fix this by automation to increase value and raise salaries. But for a given area of land, it will only take you to a certain growth level before all that becomes a non-optimal situation that drags on the growth of the city.

        I think free transit will increase a metropolitan's area for growth. The faster and more reliabl

      • Even if you don't use public transport it benefits you by reducing traffic.

        Citation? Something with real numbers and studies of a "before" and "after" public transportation please? How much traffic did it reduce and how much did it cost per car?

        Where this might seem obvious, is that a benefit to everybody? My commute is pretty short, doesn't touch even one "highway" as it's all on surface streets. Reducing traffic is not part of my needs or wants.

        Actually, I live in a large metro area (Dallas-Fort Worth) and we DO NOT have public transportation in my town at all. DART particip

    • They could do it for a reasonable cost, they just refuse to do anything that they lose money on.

    • You may not be paying for it when you use it, but it's being paid for though taxation. It's not free, far from it.

      But let's be real. "Public transportation" is ALWAYS taxpayer funded in some way. Why? Because there is no way it would be possible for the private sector to do this kind of thing at a "reasonable" cost for the average user. The business model is unworkable. The only option is to throw taxpayer funds into it.

      Very true. It comes down to, once you provide the service, how to best fund it. Doing all of it via taxation means some people will pay for it but never use it; however there are many government services that do the same thing so it balances out. People also benefit from externalities even if they never use a service they help fund via taxes. The challenge is, once it has no fare costs, is how to deal with a sudden increase in demand if it occurred? Such a change, in some cases, could overwhelm the existing

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by pjt33 ( 739471 )

      Firstly, I think you might be using an overly narrow definition of "public transportation". The private sector runs air and long-distance bus transport in much of the world without subsidies.

      Secondly, an urban bus system must surely be profitable at peak usage when it's standing room only. Urban bus subsidies are about ensuring that busses still run at off-peak times of day.

      And thirdly, even restricting to urban rail, Hong Kong's metro is an interesting exception which makes money through a rail plus proper [mckinsey.com]

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      You say that it is far from free, but are you sure?
      - Less pollution -> less sick people -> less medical costs
      - Less cars on road -> less roads needed -> savings from road building and maintenance
      - People will visit each other more (as it is free) and also on other places -> better mental health -> healthcare savings (at least in theory)
      - More attractive to tourists -> more income
      - Less cars -> People will save time when travelling due to less traffic -> time is money, so...
      - A lot

    • "You may not be paying for it when you use it, but it's being paid for though taxation. It's not free, far from it. "

      Yes, it's like roads, highways, schools and university, all 'free' here as well.

      • "You may not be paying for it when you use it, but it's being paid for though taxation. It's not free, far from it. "

        Yes, it's like roads, highways, schools and university, all 'free' here as well.

        Ah yes, nobody is saying government isn't an answer to problems. I certainly understand that there ARE things that government is best suited to do. I'm just pointing out that "free" at point of use is not exactly "free" of cost for the citizens of the city.

        I'm paying for that road I drive to work on though the taxes I pay. I don't directly benefit from the public school system (I homeschooled my kids) but I pay for it too. I use the local universities, though they are NOT free for me or my kids and I'

    • "Public transportation" is ALWAYS taxpayer funded in some way.

      So is private transportation. Who do you think pays for all those roads? Encouraging more people to use public transportation by making it free will reduce the need to build more roads and save on repair on the ones that are already there.

      Whether the benefit is worth the cost requires detailed analysis but in a densely populated country like Luxembourg I suspect the maths is much more in favour of this than in less densely populated countries like Canada where our city council is both considering either

      • "Public transportation" is ALWAYS taxpayer funded in some way.

        So is private transportation. Who do you think pays for all those roads? Encouraging more people to use public transportation by making it free will reduce the need to build more roads and save on repair on the ones that are already there. Whether the benefit is worth the cost requires detailed analysis but in a densely populated country like Luxembourg I suspect the maths is much more in favour of this than in less densely populated countries like Canada where our city council is both considering either making local transit free or increasing the price by ~30%!

        LOL.. IF you are thinking they will save money by doing this, I dare say it's unlikely to happen. Are there possible offsets to the increased costs? Sure. But I seriously doubt this is a financial winner for the city.

        Government is the least efficient and least effective way to do just about anything you can imagine. Sometimes Government is the only possible solution, such as when providing national defense and law enforcement, or as you point out maintaining infrastructure like roads, bridges, water,

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by j-beda ( 85386 )

          Government is the least efficient and least effective way to do just about anything you can imagine. Sometimes Government is the only possible solution, such as when providing national defense and law enforcement, or as you point out maintaining infrastructure like roads, bridges, water, sewer treatment and the like. But never be fooled, it's going to cost more than it should, take longer than it should and be less effective than it should when government is tasked to do something. "Public Transportation" is not an exception to this rule.

          Knee-jerk reactions of "government-bad!" always strike me as lacking in nuance.

          "Government is the least efficient and least effective way to do just about anything you can imagine." is not a rule. There are many examples to the contrary - US Medicare delivers better outcomes at lower overhead than US private insurance for one example, and virtually every publicly funder national health service is cheaper and more effective than the private provisions of healthcare in the US.

          Yes, it is true that Governmental

    • Some things are cheaper than free. To a certain extent, direct cash transfers cause an increase in GDP/C, decrease in unemployment, reduction of welfare claims, lower crime, and so forth, meaning that something like a Universal Dividend can actually reduce the operating cost of government and lead to lower taxes, while also increasing economic activity and making the rich richer.

    • Yes, it is funded through taxes. This means that it is a net gain for people that use public transportation, and a net loss for those who don't. It works as an incentive to use public transportation. Economically, it makes sense, as long as they retain the same efficiency. The total amount of money spent on transportation, by the entire population, can only go down. Actually, it would make sense to do the same things for museums, for instance: entry to a museum is always free; museums are funded through ta

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by dryeo ( 100693 )

      Transit used to be profitable. Shit, the transit company built the dams down the road that light my house, originally to power their street cars. It was one of the cost savings, electric traction.
      Unluckily, between unrealistic franchise agreements, things like the transit company being responsible for snow clearing, government subsidized road building allowing a much more spread out urban area along with the franchise forcing the transit company to serve that spread out area, subsidies for fuel and parking

    • You may not be paying for it when you use it, but it's being paid for though taxation. It's not free, far from it.

      Good thing that's a straw man then. The "free" in free health care, free higher education, free public transportation is free to use . Same as it's free for you to use any of the public roads or highways without paying a toll to use them. Which none of the people who complain about the cost of mass transit had a problem with when it was time to spend trillions to construct them.

  • Do the math (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward

    33 hours a year in traffic jams on average? If you make 10 trips a week for 50 weeks that's 500 trips per year. 33 hours / 500 trips is abou 4 minutes per trip stuck in traffic. That's "some of the worst traffic in the world"?

    • My commute is 40 miles each way. 4 days a week, though on an annual basis about 180 days.

      Morning, 45 minutes, no delays.

      Evening, 50-75 minutes, delays 5-30 minutes, average about 15 minutes. Yearly, about 1350 minutes. 22 hours, close enough.

      And this is nowhere near the worst commute in the US.

      Yes, yes, they pay me more than enough to justify the ride. And no, telecommuting or working from home would diminish my productivity. Late next year I'll move to a location about 15 minutes closer. Woot.

    • Re: (Score:3)

      by pz ( 113803 )

      Thus spake Anonymous Coward:

      33 hours a year in traffic jams on average? If you make 10 trips a week for 50 weeks that's 500 trips per year. 33 hours / 500 trips is abou 4 minutes per trip stuck in traffic. That's "some of the worst traffic in the world"?

      From the linked article, which rather paints a very different picture than the one suggested by the summary and questioned by our AC (emphasis in bold added):

      How much time a year do Luxembourgers spend stuck in traffic jams?

      With 33 hours, Luxembourg City ranks 134th in the world out of more than 1,000 cities analysed.

      22-02-2017

      According to a study published recently by the American company Inrix, drivers in Luxembourg City spent an average of 33 hours in traffic jams in 2016. This result puts Luxembourg City in 134th place. Esch-sur-Alzette, another town in the Grand Duchy included in the study, fares better, with just 21 hours spent stuck in traffic jams. It ranks 350th on the list.

      To draw up its ranking, Inrix analysed the road traffic situation in 1,064 towns in 38 different countries. Inrix accumulated 500 terabytes of data from 300 million different sources, covering 8 million kilometres of roads.
      International competition

      Compared with the major cities at the top of the list, the cliché of Luxembourg City as a congested capital clogged by its road traffic needs to be moderated. In comparison, for example, the inhabitants of the city of Los Angeles spent 104.1 hours in traffic jams, the inhabitants of Moscow 91.4 hours, and New Yorkers 89.4 hours.

      In Europe, the ranking is led by the major cities in Russia. That does not mean that the big cities of western Europe are unencumbered. Londoners spend an average of 73.4 hours in traffic jams, while Parisians manage to waste 65.3 hours.

      Overall, cities close to the Grand Duchy fared rather better than Luxembourg City. Metz is in 944th place, with 6.6 hours of traffic jams. Thionville is in 724th place, with 10.3 hours of traffic jams a year, and Saarlouis in 669th place, with 11.4 hours of traffic jams.

      Two main factors may explain the difference between Luxembourg City and these examples. Firstly, Luxembourg City has a high ratio of cars per household, and secondly, more than half the people who work in the Grand Duchy are cross-border workers, and they need a means of transport. Given the particular circumstances of the Grand Duchy, the Government is investing in improving and extending public transport (examples include the tram project and a car-sharing app).

    • "33 hours a year in traffic jams on average? If you make 10 trips a week for 50 weeks ..."

      I'll stop you right there, everybody has at least 5-7 weeks of vacation (depending on the job) and they take every single day, all of them.

      Second, the country is 40*60 miles, normally people would only need between 5 and 20 minutes if there was no traffic jam.

  • From a Lux. Native (Score:5, Interesting)

    by 4im ( 181450 ) on Friday December 07, 2018 @10:18AM (#57765376)

    First off - the state already pays for something like 80% of the cost of public transport. Going 100% won't make much of a difference on the budget.

    Traffic is indeed quite horrible, with all the commuting and street works. Luxembourg (which isn't only one city btw) is by far the most active economic center of the region, and so pulls in a lot of workers who live up to 2h (in normal conditions) driving away. It's also gotten a lot worse these past decades.

    Public transport isn't very effective now on many lines, because it will suffer from works too (trains as well as buses), buses will be stuck in traffic just as much as cars. And "people incidents", let's not forget those. Lots of economic areas are badly covered, as the public transport lines are mostly aligned for Luxembourg City only - if you want to go somewhere else, good luck, count in a lot more time. To get people to switch from private cars to public transport would take a massively better quality, different lines... which isn't really on the to-do list as far as "we the people" can see.

    Making things free won't automatically improve the quality of public transport, thus... things will probably remain as they are.

    There's also the impression that something free isn't worth anything, some people will think they're entitled, will show poor respect to personnel etc., so we're really not that happy about this upcoming change, fearing that quality will actually go down.

    Not much impact for me anyway - I live close enough to work for walking, which I do when weather won't permit the use of the motorbike (much easier to find parking space that using a car!).

  • Note that the total land area of Luxembourg (998 mi) is approximately that of Rhode Island in the U.S. (1,212 mi), according to Google.

    Just sayin'. ;-)

  • The population of the country of Luxembourg is 590,00. This is about equivalent to the population of Wyoming, which is the least populated state in the United states. As another post in this thread noted, Luxembourg is slightly smaller than Rhode Island. However, Rhode Island has a population of 1.05 million, or about twice that of Luxembourg.

    Luxembourg City has a population of 110,000, which is actually less than the number of people who would attend a University of Michigan Football game on a Saturday
  • It's not free like they said it will be. It's just that they won't pay for it when you get on. It will be paid for from the taxes collected by the state, which will be going higher to cover the costs. TANSTAAFL.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

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