Overview

• After Friday’s peak travel wave, highway congestion across North Rhine-Westphalia fell to about 20 kilometers by Saturday midday, according to WDR-Verkehrsbüro.
• Düsseldorf and Köln/Bonn airports expect to handle over five million passengers during the six-week summer break, with roughly 220,000 travelers at Düsseldorf alone from Friday through Sunday.
• Enhanced airport processes—including self-service baggage drop and security-slot bookings—have kept security wait times below ten minutes at both hubs.
• Deutsche Bahn NRW forecasts higher train occupancy and advises travelers to avoid main peak hours, use live load indicators on bahn.de or the DB Navigator app, and reserve seats in advance.
• Seasonal measures such as weekend truck bans, digital load monitoring and staggered departure advisories have strengthened the region’s capacity to absorb holiday traffic surges.