There will be less pressure on Deutsche Bahn to deliver letters as quickly.
ADVERTISEMENTDomestic flights will no longer be used to transport letters by Germany’s national postal carrier.
The move from Deutsche Post reflects the declining significance of letter mail and allows it to improve its climate footprint.
After 63 years, the last planes carrying letters between northern and southern Germany, operated by Lufthansa unit Eurowings and Tui Fly, flew overnight on 28 March on the Stuttgart-Berlin, Hannover-Munich and Hannover-Stuttgart routes.
Letters between those destinations will now be transported by road, allowing the company to reduce transport-related carbon dioxide emissions on the routes by over 80 per cent.
“In times of climate change, airmail for domestic letters within Germany can no longer be justified - also because there is no longer the same urgency associated with letter mail as in decades past,” Marc Hitschfeld, chief operations officer of parent company DHL Group's German mail and parcel division, said in a statement.
German move helped by wider delivery windows
Draft legislation approved by the German Cabinet in December, which still needs parliamentary approval, is set to reduce pressure on Deutsche Post to deliver letters quickly, allowing it to cut costs.
At present, the mail service is supposed to deliver at least 80 per cent of letters on the working day after they are mailed.
Under the planned new rules, it will have to deliver 95 per cent by the third working day.
German domestic mail flights started in September 1961. Both the volume of mail carried by air and the number of destinations served have declined drastically since the mid-1990s.
Where else in Europe still uses domestic air mail?
The majority of mail within the EU is sent by airmail, unless road or rail transport is speedier.
Since European countries come in all shapes and sizes, the domestic picture varies considerably.
In the UK, for example, around five per cent of domestic mail is transported by air. According to the Royal Mail’s latest ESG report, eighteen routes - representing 50 per cent of air emissions - could be removed with greater flexibility in delivery windows at the destination office.
