Following distance

The pattern to read in the table above is that two things escalate at once: the smaller the fraction of the half-speedometer value, and the higher the speed you were doing, the harder the row. Points appear before bans do, and bans appear part-way up the ladder rather than at its top.

On the fastest ladder in the reviewed data set, the first row carrying a standard driving ban is the one at over 100 km/h with a gap under 3/10 of the half-speedometer value. Above it the ban length rises rather than the amount alone.

Following distance is normally established from a fixed installation or a camera vehicle over a stretch of road, which means the evidence in these cases is a recording and a computation. The tiers above tell you exactly which fraction band you have been placed in; the row you were placed in is the thing an objection would be about.

It also means the measurement is not instantaneous. A gap has to be held for a stretch of road to be charged, which is why a moment of closing up behind a braking vehicle is a different thing from the conduct these rows describe. Whether that distinction was respected in your case is a question about the recording, not about the table.

The underlying duty is expressed in the road-traffic ordinance in words rather than in metres: enough distance to stop behind the vehicle in front, whatever happens. Half the speedometer reading, in metres, is the working expression of that duty, and the annex that scores the offence uses fractions of that figure as its own unit.

So the fractions in the table above are not an enforcement rule of thumb layered on top of the statute — they are how the instrument itself measures. At speed the arithmetic is unforgiving: on the fastest ladder, a gap that would be comfortable at urban speeds is already several tiers up.

The base rows below the ladders are the ordinary case, starting at 25 € with no points, and the first tier that leaves them behind is over 80 km/h, gap under a quarter of the half-speedometer value. From there, points come first and bans follow — the first row on the fastest ladder that carries a standard driving ban is the one at over 100 km/h with a gap under 3/10 of the half-speedometer value.

A distance offence at the sharper end is one of the few places in this catalogue where a single event with no collision and no other aggravating fact produces a ban at the same time as points. It is also, unlike speeding, an offence where the repeat rule does not do the work — the ladder itself gets there.

If your licence was issued outside Germany, note again what a German ban is and is not: an order not to drive in Germany. What your own authority makes of a German decision depends on arrangements between the two states, which this site has not sourced and does not describe.