Strange street signs and commuter trains
Ze street signs
I decided that, since I am joining the tech-geeky generation by buying a Smartphone (Samsung Galaxy 5, like it so far) and Facebook is evul and only allows logged-in people to see the pictures, and I am far to lazy to double-upload everything, imma gonna get a twitter account. Connected to twitpic, you see =)
So if anyone wants to see my random photos from Berlin (which I will try to remember to actually take, ehehe) you can find my tweetages @dansandem
This photo, I just have to share twice:
I _boggled_ seeing those signs during my walk, lemme tell you! Now, you gotta know some pretty recent German history to understand that bogglement, and I most certainly do not know the whole story!
But, basically Dutschke was a left-activist and student leader. He was shot by a right-wing extremist in 1968, survived but was severly wounded.
And Axel Springer was the then owner of the Springer-group which, among other things, owned the magazine Bild which went out very hard against the student movement and agitated in what to me looks like a pretty Sarah Palinish way (less crazy religion tho).
Eh, right, the Springer main offices is also right by this crossing.
Sooooo basically I stood there wondering whether I misremembered a name (Springer, Sprenger, what do I know? Apparantly I didn't), if this was some kind of German expression of black humor, if it was a protest against Springer or what. So of course I had to photograph it, and from what I can see off Wikipedia, it's basically a combined memorial for Dutschke and a bit of a "Fuck off!" to Springer.
If anyone has more information or a link about this, do share because it seems fascinating =D
Så var det det där med lokaltrafiken aka My thoughts on BVG vs. SL
(I suspect the rest of this post will mainly interest
lanjelin but what the hell she's not here so I can discuss it face to face so you ALL GET TO SHARE =D)
BVG = The peeps running the trains, buses etc in Berlin
SL = Dito, but Stockholm
Hands down, when it comes to communicating by train, Berlin wins by so much. (before someone pipes up with "but Berlin is a giant metropol" no it ain't. It's about twice the population of Stockholm and has a density of 3500 ppl/km2 vs 3300 ppl/km2 according to Wikipedia. Course, it's been larger than Stockholm used to be but otoh Berlin isn't growing very fast at all while Stockholm is. Or was, until people stopped having anywhere to live)
But you can get almost everywhere with the train - yes, I'm living in the middle of the city now, but even back when I was out in Erkner (which was a reaaaally small place, way more rural than either Flempan or Handen) you could take the train towards Berlin and change lines way before you had reached the city proper. I'm just saying, when SL.se suggests that I travel into Gullmarsplan with the bus and then switch to the Tvärbana as the fastest way to reach another suburb? I am not happy
Here, otoh, I only had to take a bus when I wanted to travel between the small villages outside of Erkner. I am informed that the inner-city buses are good and run pretty much all night, though, so I may have to try them out here too =)
It's much cheaper to buy single-travel in Berlin (especially as they last two hours, compared to Stockholm's one) as well as one-day tickets. I do think that until the most recent raise, the monthly card was cheaper in Stockholm, but now Berlin wins there too. And the student discount, holy crap I almost couldn't believe it! When you sign up for school, it costs about 200 euro in which is included a discount card for the cafeteria and a ticket for the entire term. That my dears, is super cheap.
So: If you work and buy a monthly ticket, the difference in cost ain't that huge. If you're a visitor or a student, Berlin FTW
One place where it's mostly a YMMW is the matter of . Berlin has no ticket barriers, that is, you buy a ticket and stamp it in a little box-onna-pole that stands on the platform. In Stockholm, there's all kinds of trapdoors which you can't pass without a valid ticket (except some stations far outside the town)
Berlin pro: No getting stuck behind a slow-ass n00b who can't show a ticket, no getting eaten by an overeager automatic door, you can basically sprint up the stairs and onto the train unhindered. And if you're minded that way, fair evasion is super-duper easy.
Cons: If you're not minded that way - and there's plenty of controls, especially in the subway on weekdays - it's damn easy to forget to buy/validate a ticket. Not fun when you see the guards coming closer and experience that wonderful "Oh shiiiiiit" moment just before you're 40 euro poorer...
Also, the goddamned ticket machines can be an annoying experience. While I have always found them very user friendly (and they're all multi-lingual) a great del of them only accept coins (and the EC-card, which I don't have). Can you say ARGH? You're standing there, in a hurry, the train is gonna come any minute now and you don't have anything smaller than a ten-euro bill. Very frustrating.
Stockholm pro: The acess card is actually pretty nice and our ticket machines take pretty much all credit cards. For cash payment, either one buys it at a kiosk or by the turnstill, since they tend to be operated (and you don't get fined if they weren't).
On the other hand, the turnstills slow everything down, tend to "bite", are tricky when you've got luggage and they don't help much since even the newest ones are very easy to jump. Heck, the old model I could just step over. And they cost loads and loads of money, apparantly.
If you're after barrier free in the sense that you appreciate/need escalators and elevators, ah well, then in theory Stockholm is a clear winner. There are elevators pretty much on every station here too, but you have to walk around a lot more to find them. For instance, many tracks run up on bridges and have no escalators one elevator per platform compared to 4-6 stairway exits. Course, depending on where you live, those escalators may not be running most of the time.
Oh, and there one more way that the BVG wins. THE *BLEEPING* TRAINS ACTUALLY RUN. ON TIME. Sure, delays happen, but they're an exception, not the norm
And since school starts tomorrow, I really gotta sleep now!
Originally posted at Dreamwidth.
I decided that, since I am joining the tech-geeky generation by buying a Smartphone (Samsung Galaxy 5, like it so far) and Facebook is evul and only allows logged-in people to see the pictures, and I am far to lazy to double-upload everything, imma gonna get a twitter account. Connected to twitpic, you see =)
So if anyone wants to see my random photos from Berlin (which I will try to remember to actually take, ehehe) you can find my tweetages @dansandem
This photo, I just have to share twice:
I _boggled_ seeing those signs during my walk, lemme tell you! Now, you gotta know some pretty recent German history to understand that bogglement, and I most certainly do not know the whole story!
But, basically Dutschke was a left-activist and student leader. He was shot by a right-wing extremist in 1968, survived but was severly wounded.
And Axel Springer was the then owner of the Springer-group which, among other things, owned the magazine Bild which went out very hard against the student movement and agitated in what to me looks like a pretty Sarah Palinish way (less crazy religion tho).
Eh, right, the Springer main offices is also right by this crossing.
Sooooo basically I stood there wondering whether I misremembered a name (Springer, Sprenger, what do I know? Apparantly I didn't), if this was some kind of German expression of black humor, if it was a protest against Springer or what. So of course I had to photograph it, and from what I can see off Wikipedia, it's basically a combined memorial for Dutschke and a bit of a "Fuck off!" to Springer.
If anyone has more information or a link about this, do share because it seems fascinating =D
Så var det det där med lokaltrafiken aka My thoughts on BVG vs. SL
(I suspect the rest of this post will mainly interest
lanjelin but what the hell she's not here so I can discuss it face to face so you ALL GET TO SHARE =D)
BVG = The peeps running the trains, buses etc in Berlin
SL = Dito, but Stockholm
Hands down, when it comes to communicating by train, Berlin wins by so much. (before someone pipes up with "but Berlin is a giant metropol" no it ain't. It's about twice the population of Stockholm and has a density of 3500 ppl/km2 vs 3300 ppl/km2 according to Wikipedia. Course, it's been larger than Stockholm used to be but otoh Berlin isn't growing very fast at all while Stockholm is. Or was, until people stopped having anywhere to live)
But you can get almost everywhere with the train - yes, I'm living in the middle of the city now, but even back when I was out in Erkner (which was a reaaaally small place, way more rural than either Flempan or Handen) you could take the train towards Berlin and change lines way before you had reached the city proper. I'm just saying, when SL.se suggests that I travel into Gullmarsplan with the bus and then switch to the Tvärbana as the fastest way to reach another suburb? I am not happy
Here, otoh, I only had to take a bus when I wanted to travel between the small villages outside of Erkner. I am informed that the inner-city buses are good and run pretty much all night, though, so I may have to try them out here too =)
It's much cheaper to buy single-travel in Berlin (especially as they last two hours, compared to Stockholm's one) as well as one-day tickets. I do think that until the most recent raise, the monthly card was cheaper in Stockholm, but now Berlin wins there too. And the student discount, holy crap I almost couldn't believe it! When you sign up for school, it costs about 200 euro in which is included a discount card for the cafeteria and a ticket for the entire term. That my dears, is super cheap.
So: If you work and buy a monthly ticket, the difference in cost ain't that huge. If you're a visitor or a student, Berlin FTW
One place where it's mostly a YMMW is the matter of . Berlin has no ticket barriers, that is, you buy a ticket and stamp it in a little box-onna-pole that stands on the platform. In Stockholm, there's all kinds of trapdoors which you can't pass without a valid ticket (except some stations far outside the town)
Berlin pro: No getting stuck behind a slow-ass n00b who can't show a ticket, no getting eaten by an overeager automatic door, you can basically sprint up the stairs and onto the train unhindered. And if you're minded that way, fair evasion is super-duper easy.
Cons: If you're not minded that way - and there's plenty of controls, especially in the subway on weekdays - it's damn easy to forget to buy/validate a ticket. Not fun when you see the guards coming closer and experience that wonderful "Oh shiiiiiit" moment just before you're 40 euro poorer...
Also, the goddamned ticket machines can be an annoying experience. While I have always found them very user friendly (and they're all multi-lingual) a great del of them only accept coins (and the EC-card, which I don't have). Can you say ARGH? You're standing there, in a hurry, the train is gonna come any minute now and you don't have anything smaller than a ten-euro bill. Very frustrating.
Stockholm pro: The acess card is actually pretty nice and our ticket machines take pretty much all credit cards. For cash payment, either one buys it at a kiosk or by the turnstill, since they tend to be operated (and you don't get fined if they weren't).
On the other hand, the turnstills slow everything down, tend to "bite", are tricky when you've got luggage and they don't help much since even the newest ones are very easy to jump. Heck, the old model I could just step over. And they cost loads and loads of money, apparantly.
If you're after barrier free in the sense that you appreciate/need escalators and elevators, ah well, then in theory Stockholm is a clear winner. There are elevators pretty much on every station here too, but you have to walk around a lot more to find them. For instance, many tracks run up on bridges and have no escalators one elevator per platform compared to 4-6 stairway exits. Course, depending on where you live, those escalators may not be running most of the time.
Oh, and there one more way that the BVG wins. THE *BLEEPING* TRAINS ACTUALLY RUN. ON TIME. Sure, delays happen, but they're an exception, not the norm
And since school starts tomorrow, I really gotta sleep now!
Originally posted at Dreamwidth.