Passengers will once again be able to see detailed monthly railway delay data after the Hungarian government reversed a controversial reporting change introduced under former transport minister János Lázár.

Transport and Investment Minister Dávid Vitézy announced on Tuesday that MÁV has resumed publishing expanded monthly punctuality statistics, restoring a level of transparency that had disappeared at the end of 2024.

Vitézy: “Lázár-era secrecy is over”

In a Facebook post, Vitézy said the railway operator had changed the way it reported delays in late 2024 on the instructions of his predecessor, János Lázár (probably because 2024 saw 7 years’ worth of delays at the Hungarian railways?). According to the minister, instead of publishing the detailed data that had been available for many years, MÁV switched to a single aggregated dataset each month, making it more difficult for passengers and journalists to assess the railway’s actual performance.

“The intention was clear, just as with the shutdown of the Vonatinfó service: if passengers and journalists don’t know about the problems, there’s no need to solve them,” Vitézy wrote. He argued that the strategy failed because commuters experience delays firsthand every day.

More transparency, even if trains are still late

Vitézy stressed that restoring detailed statistics would not immediately make trains run on time. “The trains won’t become more punctual overnight, and the figures may even worsen given the legacy we’ve inherited,” he acknowledged.

However, he said the government wants to confront problems openly rather than conceal them.

“As minister, I believe honesty is needed instead of secrecy and arrogance, especially given the difficult state Hungary’s transport system has been left in after years of decline,” he wrote.

Vonatinfó and other transport data also restored

The minister said the move is part of a transparency drive. He noted that the government has already restored public access to the EMIG railway information system and relaunched Vonatinfó, the popular real-time train tracking service that had previously been discontinued. While acknowledging that the new statistics portal can still be improved, Vitézy said it already provides substantially more information than the previous version.

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Focus on solving, not hiding, railway problems

According to Vitézy, the aim is not to improve the appearance of railway performance but to create the conditions for genuine improvements. He said passengers deserve an honest picture of the state of Hungary’s public transport system, arguing that recognising the scale of the challenges is the first step towards addressing them. The detailed monthly delay statistics are now once again available through MÁV’s official reporting system.

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