BVG | Berlin-Mahlsdorf: Double-track tram can come

Single-track tram in oncoming traffic – this is what the situation is like on Hönower Strasse in Mahlsdorf today. Photo: Nicolas Šustr The documents for the plan approval procedure for the double-track expansion of the tram on Hönower Strasse in Mahlsdorf are “complete, plausible and internally consistent”. The planning approval authority informed the Berliner Verkehrsbetriebe (BVG) of this on August 11th, reports Petra Nelken at the request of “nd”. She is spokesperson for Transport Senator Ute Bonde (CDU).

This means that the documents for the project should be made publicly available very soon and then the further steps of the process up to the planning approval decision - the building permit - should take place. After the completion of the measure, which is not expected before 2030, tram line 62 can finally run every ten minutes to the Mahlsdorf S-Bahn station - an appropriate service for the eastern tangential connection to the Köpenick S-Bahn station and further into the old town of Köpenick.

This may not have happened yet out of consideration for the CDU's local election campaign. For many years, the fight against the chosen variant for the implementation of the “Mahlsdorf transport solution” was part of the political folklore of the CDU grandees there - once the ex-social senator and former Bundestag member Mario Czaja, now the education senator Katharina Günther-Wünsch, the partner of the still-governing mayor Kai Wegner.

And at the Marzahn-Hellersdorf district level, the CDU, with the support of the local SPD House of Representatives member Jan Lehmann, also opposed the solution, which envisages relocating car through traffic to the An der Schule street, which is being expanded. According to Senate studies, this is the best solution to enable the tram on the narrow Hönower Straße to travel obstruction-free on two tracks and to have enough space for cycle paths and sufficiently wide sidewalks.

“Today, this planning has progressed so far in terms of procedural law that fundamental changes would actually amount to a new start.”

One of the arguments was the danger to children posed by the new route on the main street in front of a school. That's almost a bit funny coming from representatives of a party that pursued the abolition of the 30 km/h speed limit on busy school routes with almost holy zeal.

But in this case, Transport Senator Ute Bonde did not give in to her party friends and did not develop alternative ideas such as a magnetic levitation train instead of expanding the tram. In November 2024, Katharina Günther-Wünsch, the transport senator, made the citizens' dissatisfaction felt after years of CDU agitation against this solution at a local meeting.

»Costs have already been incurred. Feasibility studies have been carried out. Variant tests have been carried out,” argued Bonde at the time. And that the BVG would need an additional tram and more drivers for a tour on the longer route via the street An der Schule. “And these facts, these facts, cannot simply be turned back per se, but they are in the world, they are on file,” the Transport Senator continued.

In May 2026, Günther-Wünsch and her colleagues finally gave in. After another citizen dialogue on site, the member of the House of Representatives published a comprehensive explanation for the change: "Today, this planning has progressed so far in terms of procedural law that fundamental changes would actually amount to a new start."

“We would lose a lot of time and money and the decision would be very susceptible to lawsuits,” it continues. It is explained that the Court of Auditors would also take a close look at this. He had already looked at the CDU's illegal allocation of funds for projects against anti-Semitism, which cost some CDU Senate members their office.

"The realization of the need to finally relieve the Mahlsdorf district center of traffic, to establish a stable 10-minute frequency on the tram and to create attractive footpaths and cycle paths came very late for the local CDU and that to the detriment of the people of Mahlsdorf and the entire district," explained left-wing transport politician Kristian Ronneburg at the time.

Ronneburg recalled “how vehemently the CDU has repeatedly brought new alternative variants into play in recent years that had neither hand nor footing.” At first there was an additional meeting point for the tram, which would be sufficient. Then it was a bypass road in Hoppegarten that would solve the problem. And finally it was the exchange of the route variant, so that the tram had to turn awkwardly and run over the street An der Schule.

"If the locally responsible representative for Mahlsdorf wasn't also an education senator who tried to have a direct influence on her colleagues and interfere in their specialist areas, we could have had this solution much earlier," said the left-wing politician.

The entire project will probably only be dry once the planning approval has been passed. It is still not available for the separately applied for road construction, although the process began in September 2023. With the tram, it remains to be seen how fast it actually goes in the end.

A look at other projects in East Berlin shows that, despite the current progress, there may still be significant delays. The process for the construction of a new 1.2 kilometer long tram line, which will take line 21 to Ostkreuz train station, has been going on for almost nine years. And there is no conclusion in sight for the process initiated in June 2020 to expand the tram on Adlershofer Dörpfeldstrasse to two tracks. In functioning communities, a period of two years is generally assumed for the planning approval process. There may also be additional periods of time for possible legal proceedings.

It therefore remains to be seen when the planning history of the Mahlsdorf traffic solution, which has now spanned a quarter of a century, will enter the implementation phase.

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