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 Ticket machine (for
train, bus, streetcar) by Trekki
So, the use of ticket machines for train (short distance travels), bus and streetcars is quite essential. Compared to so many other countries I travelled in… as for so many things… the ones in Germany seem to be quite complicated to operate.
First you choose your destination (left on the machine “Wählen Sie Ihr Fahrtziel”), which is the first challenge, as even when I use these things, my destination is not always easy to find on the offered list. The list is alphabetical; the destinations have a number next to them.
So, when you have found the destination (if in doubt, choose the most closest and claim to be the foreigner when encountering some ticket controller later, this works !), type in the number (middle), choose adult or kid, and then the type of ticket.
Einzelfahrt is one way, Tageskarte is day ticket, Gruppentageskarte stands for groups of 5, and Zuschlag is supplement, which is only necessary for trains like IC and ICE (Intercity or IC Europe), but not for busses and streetcars.
You can also get a weekly (Wochenkarte) or monthly ticket (Monatskarte), and Bahncard is accepted also by now for shorter travel distances.
The price is shown on the display (top middle), and theoretically this display can switch languages, but I have seen some where only German was available….
You can pay with cash (coins or banknotes), and credit card.
For train tickets, there is usually a ticket counter available in the main hall (7 a.m. – 7 p.m.), but for travelling short train distances, it is better to use this machine, as the counters are usually packed with customers :-)
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 if you spot this - slow
down !! by Trekki
The local municipalities seem to always lack money in their boxes, so they find ways to fill them up.
One of their favourites is to fine car drivers for all and everything :-)
The pic shows a so-called "Vogelhaeuschen" (bird box), with cameras installed in.
They make nice pictures when your speed is too high or you pass a red (or dark orange) traffic light.
Make sure you spot them and slow down or resist the attempt to just make it at dark orange.
They are everywhere, in cities, on country roads and Autobahns.
However, I do not know what happens if a foreign car (driver) get tickets, but in case you rent a car, the rental company will make sure that you pay the ticket.
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 Parking for residents
with special ID !! by Trekki
On the white sign below the inviting “P” (parking), you see the word “Bewohner” for residents. Well, this does not mean that all residents who live close by, can park there, another tricky thing is needed – an “Parkausweis” which is a kind of parking ID, but now even more, the parking ID must be of “N II”, not N I, N III or any other letter/number.
With letters/numbers like that – in this case N II – the city officials divide a town into little districts, and hand out these parking IDs only for a specific district.
I have seen these special parking ID requirements so far in Heidelberg, Marburg and Speyer – but they are certainly necessary for a lot of other towns.
For Heidelberg I even heard stories of different treatment for the different parking offenders:
If a Heidelberg resident, having such an ID card, is parking just in the next district (e.g. N I parks in N II), the traffic wardens will look away.
Any other car gets fined, and some special stories even tell that the traffic girls do “foreigner hunting”, just strolling through the streets looking for non-German cars only to fine them.
Conclusion:
Stay away with your car when you see such signs: Bewohner, Parkausweis and letters + numbers !
Your travel budget will be happy ! Leave a Comment Theme: Car/Motor Home
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(this is also in "local customs" - but I'm not sure where it belongs better - any suggestion is appreciated :-)
As probably all countries all over the world, the budgets of the government is tight…so they have to make sure, they get it filled….
What seems more easy than to draw it out of the pockets of the people who place their cars some where ?
Apart from parking places (designed as such) or park houses or garages, you can park your car on the sidewalk, if the signs allow you. For most of them, you’ll find specific signs to tell you what to do = what to use or how to pay.
Pic 1 shows the “Parken mit Parkscheibe” (the red square, marked on the pic), parking with a special parking “card”, which you can get at gas stations. Parking is for free, if you see that sign, you only need to place this card visible in your car, and set it on the time you arrived. The "Mo-Fr 8-20 h (etc)" says that you need to display this card only during the time, noticed there
Pic 2 shows "Parken mit Parkschein", which means you need to draw a paper, which is put in the car to tell the hour until you are "allowed" to park there. The machines are close by; pic 3 shows such a machine. The price depends on the region; I paid for example 15 cents per 30 minutes (in Darmstadt, June 2006). The machines only work with cash (coins), so be prepared.
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 View from my office window in
Frankfurt am Main by Nemorino
Their policies: higher speeds, more stops at airports, fewer stops anywhere else, more delays, less leg room. They even tried to abolish the 50% rail card and the dining cars, but these fiendish schemes were thwarted by energetic resistance from consumer groups like Pro Bahn and VCD (Verkehrsclub Deutschland) -- if you live in Germany, by all means join these worthy organizations, and of course ADFC, the General German Cycling Club.
Here's an example of management policies in the German rail system: They recently built a sinfully expensive (that's a Germanism: sündhaft teuer) high speed rail line between Frankfurt and Cologne, and initially advertised that it would take less than an hour to get from one city to the other. In fact, it now takes an hour and ten minutes at the very least, because they insist on sending ALL the trains on a slow loop to Frankfurt Airport before finally getting onto the new line to Cologne, which turns out to be half in tunnels and is rather like a roller coaster at 250 km per hour.
If you're not in a hurry, try to get a train on the old route along the Rhine via Mainz and Koblenz. A direct train by that route takes two hours and twenty-two minutes from Frankfurt to Cologne, with great views of the castles along the Rhine River.
Only about a third of these trains still have dining cars, though, so if you want a meal be sure it says BordRestaurant in the timetable -- not BordBistro, which is just a place to loiter around and have a beer and inhale other people's cigarette smoke.
Update: At long last, all trains in Germany are now 100% smoke free! So you can now have a beer in the BordBistro without stinking of other people's addictions afterwards. Leave a Comment
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 Bicycle station Aschaffenburg by Nemorino
The closest one I know of is this one in Aschaffenburg, a city on the Main River some fifty kilometers upstream from Frankfurt.
Bicycle parking here costs EUR 0.70 per day, EUR 7.00 per month or EUR 70.00 per year.
Bicycles can also be bought, rented and repaired here. Commuters can leave their bikes here in the morning, go to work by train and pick them up in the evening. Repairs, if needed, can be done during the day while the owner is off at work.
(Another city that is badly in need of a bicycle station like this is Heidelberg, where the bicycle parking situation at the central station is highly chaotic.) Leave a Comment
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 BordBistro in a German
InterCity train by Nemorino
These places are OK for having a cup of coffee on a Sunday morning when they aren't too full, but when they get crowded they can be very unpleasant since smoking is now allowed again and the one poor person behind the counter has no chance of keeping up if there are thirty people all wanting something at the same time.
Some of the fancier trains have both a BordBistro and a BordRestaurant, which is a good solution. In the timetables there is often a coffee cup symbol for BordBistro and/or a knife-and-fork symbol for BordRestaurant.
Update: At long last, all trains in Germany are now 100% smoke free! So you can now have a beer in the BordBistro without stinking of other people's addictions afterwards. Leave a Comment
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It is illegal to pass on the right lane. This has to do with the not existing speed limits. There will be a fine for passing on the right lane.
Children under 12 are not allowed in the front seats.
It is not allowed to make mobile calls while driving = with the mobile on your ear. Fines are up to 60 Euro.
Speed limits:
50 km/h (31 mph): in cities and towns;
100 km/hr (62 mph): outside of cities and motorways. A city limit is usually defined by the yellow city/town sign with a diagonal red bar (= saying that you leave the city, see photo 3 = village of Forst).
Inside of towns, you will often see signs with 30 km/h (19 mph), which is to protect the people from being killed by the want-to-be-Schumachers.
Something, which is getting more and more popular are the so-called traffic calming areas, where either bumps are on the street or trees and shrubs planted left and right on the streets to make sure the cars slow down (see photo).
Also popular in resident areas, or near schools and kindergardens are the blue signs (as in screenshot photo 2): cars must slow down to so-called “Schritt-geschwindigkeit” (signalling speed), not more than 10 km/h (6 mph) and pedestrians, kids, etc have always priority.
Don (@Nemorino) explained these traffic calming areas much better then I can ever do in his Freiburg page
A good overview of the traffic signs is given on this page, but… unfortunately only in German. I try and take pictures of the most relevant ones in the future:
German traffic signs
A more brief English website of German traffic signs is in the link below. Leave a Comment
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Since just recently (October 2006), we have a new law here for driving in winter (conditions).
All cars MUST have appropriate tyres and frost protection, when being on the road.
If a car constrains traffic or causes an accident and does NOT have the appropriate equipment, the driver will be fined with 40 - 60 Euro.
Haha, I laughed quite much, as this law does not really define what kind of tyres they expect. It is all - as so many new laws here - a bit fuzzy.
My recommendation:
check with your local auto association to see if your car meets the "requirement", when you plan to come here in winter.
Nevertheless, I won't give up, and try and find out more and more clear statements. Leave a Comment Theme: Car/Motor Home
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One remark beforehand – yes, we don’t have a general speed limit on motorways / Autobahnen. However, you will see speed limits at major traffic knots and crossings, in “dangerous areas” or at construction sites.
Our recommended speed limit is 130 km/h (81 mph), which you will see signposted every one and then along the motorways.
BUT:
Please refrain from the attempt to rent a Porsche and fly over the motorways just like Michael Schumacher. This will result in accidents and traffic jams and neither you or your family will be happy with the result.
Even if I might sound arrogant or mothering (ahh, am I not cruel now to the boys ??), just face the fact that if you are used to speed limits in your homecountry, you will most probably not be able to handle a car at 180 km/h (111 mph). This is not a piece of cake in general, and surely not in typical German motorway traffic.
Also, you will most probably encounter Germans’ most horrible = dangerous habit of driving close-up, with a distance to the car in front of only several metres. This is even driving me mad, having grown up and driving now more than 30 years here on the streets. When passing, most of the cars won’t do it with an appropriate distance to the car in front of either.
Tailgating and flashing is also a very popular misbehaving of (German) owners of biiiig biiig cars (mostly the ones with the star or the blue-white emblem = the ones who have their power under their butt rather than under the skull – ahh, I am bad…), mainly when they want the car in front to either drive faster or to move lanes.
But: be aware that you can report them to the police, and be sure, he/she will be fined. I did it once, when one of these BMW drivers tried to wipe me from the left lane (righ lane was full of trucks and no way to change). He did loose his licence for half a year and got fined with 5000 Euro……
(to be continued in next tip) Leave a Comment Theme: Car/Motor Home
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