The Problem Is Real

Germany's rail network carries millions every day — and it's under serious strain. Corridors saturated, disruptions cascading, maintenance deferred for decades. Passengers experience chronic unpredictability and lose trust in the system they need most.

Play Is Observation

When you predict whether a train will be late, you stop being a passive passenger and start analyzing the system. You notice patterns. You think about why. A single prediction is a guess — thousands of predictions from daily commuters become a collective signal no algorithm can produce alone.

What We Stand For

• Observation over complaint

  Understanding the system is more useful than being angry at it.

• Evidence over anecdote

  "This corridor has 40% higher delay variance" beats "trains are always late."

• Transparency as a civic good

  Public infrastructure deserves public measurement.

• Play as participation

  The best way to learn a system is to engage with it.

• Aligned incentives

  More players means richer collective intelligence for everyone.

The Bet

If German rail becomes perfectly reliable, L'Ottobahn becomes a very boring game.

We'd consider that the best possible outcome.

No Real Money

L'Ottobahn is a free prediction game. No real money is wagered, won, or lost. All points and rankings are purely for fun and have no monetary value.

If this isn't clear, re-read our mission: more information, less delays.

Data Sources

Timetable and stop data based on GTFS feeds from GTFS.de. Original data by DELFI e.V. (NeTEx), licensed under CC BY 4.0.

Data has been processed and adapted for use in L'Ottobahn.