possible transit glitch at WC

[mike renfro]

I ordered a stamp catalog from a dealer in the Ruhr, and I mentioned that surface would be okay, as I would be in Europe for most of Aug for the WC. He emailed me back this caveat:

"If you intended to use the S-Bahn in Berlin during your stay, please note that 2/3rd of it's trains are currently out of order. The management ignored the inspection intervalls and the local government forbid use of trains with overdue inspections."

I have no idea if this is really the case, but if so, it might present a problem. We will dump off the rental car on 14 Aug, so will be dependent upon public transportation. I'll poke around on the internet and see if I can dig anything out. If someone has alreay brought this up, sorry.

[ed gee]

A non-issue.

"Until August 9, Germany’s national railway operator Deutsche Bahn (DB) will not be running the S-Bahn lines on Berlin's main east-west axis between the Zoologischer Garten to Ostbahnof stations. To make up for the S-Bahn gap, the Berlin public transit authority BVG is running more metro trains, buses and trams while the Berlin-Brandenburg transportation network VBB is putting more regional trains into service. "

http://www.thelocal.de/national/20090720-20705.html

[mike renfro]

Thanks, I feel better. I couldn't find a reference to the problem, just the strike, which pretty severely affected commutes, but has apparantly been settled (or is on the the way to being settled).

[gh]

taking Berlin transit advice from somebody in the Ruhr is akin to taking an Angeleno's advice on how to get around San Francisco.

[imaginative]

Beware that the above gives a solution in _theory_. As we all know, what is
promised does not always hold up. (In particular when load goes above normal,
as it is bound to do shortly before the WC.)

Further, while I cannot testify about the specifics of Berlin, you can forget
above the stereotype of Germans being punctual, efficient, etc.---they are not.
Deutsche Bahn, in particular, is infamous for its incompetence.

[ed gee]

You can see the affected areas on the following:

http://www.s-bahn-berlin.de/aktuell/200 ... 090720.pdf

A relative in Berlin tells me it is taking her up to 10 minutes longer to get to work by bus, traveling from Charlottenburg to the Charité in Mitte during peak hours.

[gh]

From one of the people I'll be working with in Berlin:

<<As unbelievable as it sounds for a capital but - yes - it's indeed true. But don't worry about the time during the World Championships. We already had talks with the S-Bahn Management and they guaranteed us to provide the usual standard timetable for the line which passes by the Olympic Stadium. In addition to that the Subway is on normal schedule, so the Olympic Stadium is very good connected, despite the S-Bahn chaos now. And fortunately, Berlin has a very good bus and tram network.>>

[az2004]

german efficiency should prevent a transit nightmare...

but there are places in the world who could NOT handle the expected flow of track fans...

[gh]

Then there was Tokyo where nobody even noticed.

[mike renfro]

Stuttgart was pretty smooth too. But, obviously, smaller city, so not so much competition from the worker bees.

[mike renfro]

taking Berlin transit advice from somebody in the Ruhr is akin to taking an Angeleno's advice on how to get around San Francisco.

Yo Garry, in Germany they still have newspapers and non-Fox news. The problems with the Berlin S-Bahn management are fairly well known.

[tandfman]

This does not sound good.

http://www.time.com/time/world/article/ ... =rss-world