Her father was a train driver. That shaped Sandra Schönherr. She optimizes routes – and the work in a male domain.
By Marion Koller
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Sandra Schönherr optimizes the bus routes. Photo: Hanno Meier
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Regensburg.There is a lot going on this Thursday in the depot of the Stadtwerk.Mobility in Markomannenstrasse. Bus driver Marina Petersohn gets behind the wheel, adjusts her uniform jacket and prepares for the start. Employees wash buses. Sandra Schönherr, operations manager at Stadtwerk.Mobility, stands in the middle and tells us that six new electric buses have been purchased. A total of eleven are now rolling through the city. She studied transport economics in Dresden and had a steep career in a short period of time. What attracts a woman to this subject?
“The little one” rose quickly
Sandra Schönherr can prevail. She is the boss of 320 drivers from more than 30 nations. It’s still a male domain. Only around 20 women drive buses. “My farm,” says Schönherr when she talks about the site on Markomannenstrasse. The 37-year-old says she gets respect on an equal footing, with a clear message, but also with understanding for the job.
Sandra Schönherr at the wheel of the “Emil”. The municipal utility relies entirely on electric drives. Photo: Solfranck
Art depends on other bosses. In her office there is nothing to suggest private preferences. A map showing RVV routes and the interim bus station (IZOB) dominates one wall. To explain the advantages of the IZOB at Ernst-Reuter-Platz, Schönherr runs his index finger over the paper. “The transfer routes for passengers are getting shorter.” Your team is planning the equipment for the stops and the new departure times. When all bus traffic is handled via this hub from the end of 2021, the permanent central bus station can be built directly at the main train station, in the direction of the Galgenberg Bridge.
“If someone is contagious, there will be no more buses the next day.”
Sandra Schönherr
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Schönherr comes from Zöblitz in the Ore Mountains. Her father was a train driver. That is why she studied transport economics. “As a Bahner subsidiary, I liked it.” In Karlsruhe, she developed traffic models for cities. “I worked on the second main route from Munich,” says Schönherr. She was hired as a traffic planner for buses in Pforzheim. After two years she was at the helm of the bus business. “I was the youngest on the farm.” Pforzheim was the first “farm” in her career. Her colleagues called her “the little one”. “Years later, I found out that bets were being made on when I would leave,” she says with a smile. But she has experienced so many great things in the job that she doesn’t blame it. “I made it without any injuries.”
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How do others do it?
Munich celebrates, Regensburg closes
State capital opens central squares, sports areas and parking garages for young people, Regensburg, on the other hand, refuses to provide solutions.
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Why Regensburg? Sandra Schönherr moved to the cathedral city in November 2018 because of the attractive position, but also because she feels comfortable on the Danube. “I love the flair and the short distances,” she enthuses. The only criticism: she wants longer opening times in the supermarkets. The 37-year-old is used to shopping until midnight from the smaller Pforzheim. In Regensburg, this is only available from Edeka at the train station. Schönherr spent her first year here like a tourist. She listened to guided tours of the city and made a detour to the old town hall. Schönherr and her husband love to stroll in the old town and love to go for a walk by the river. But they have little time for that because they are building a house.
New line over the east bypass
The operations manager plans to improve the lines: “In order to make local public transport attractive, we need tangential routes that directly connect living and working.” The background: It is often criticized that many buses of the Regensburger Verkehrsverbund (RVV) head for Albertstrasse in a star shape, people change there and then have to drive out again in a different direction. Schönherr would like to defuse the bottleneck Nibelungen Bridge. It is aiming for a line over the east bypass to the east of the city with its many large companies from Continental to Osram.
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Up to 15 percent fewer passengers use the RVV compared to the pre-Corona period. The number of commuters is 25 percent less. Home office, fear of infection and a lack of tourists are the reasons. The deficit due to Corona is around six million euros. Schönherr is happy that the state rescue package will probably cover up to 95 percent of the fare losses.
The pandemic is of course also preoccupying the drivers.
The vaccination was discussed emotionally “on the farm”. Stadtwerk.Mobilität called the company doctor twice so that anyone who wanted it could be protected. The drivers still do not meet in the break rooms, because superspreading is the boss’s nightmare. “If someone is contagious, there will be no more buses the next day.”
Further articles from this section can be found under City of Regensburg.
