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The first time I was in Berlin I had to take a bus. It was just leaving the stop as I was getting there, but stopped at the next red light. So I ran to the bus
by bambax 2mo ago
The first time I was in Berlin I had to take a bus. It was just leaving the stop as I was getting there, but stopped at the next red light. So I ran to the bus and knocked on the door. The driver looked at me with a concerned look to see if something was wrong, and once he understood I was just asking to come onboard outside of the regular stop, he laughed. Not ironically or in a mean way: it was a genuine laugh like I was doing something so weird and out of this world that it had to be a prank. And when the light turned green, he just left.
I could not believe it; but when I told the story to my German friends they too didn't quite understand why anyone would try to board a bus outside of a stop.
Being French, I have a hard time understanding why you wouldn't.
- dot_treo 2mo agoIt is actually an insurance kind of thing as far as I understand. I've had plenty of cases where the bus couldn't continue due to being in a traffic jam, and people who would have happily get off the bus couldn't either.
- lukan 2mo agoWhenever something convenient in germany is not possible, you can bet it is a insurance thing.
- cineticdaffodil 2mo agoLeave the windows leaned open so it cools down in the office over night? Impossible due to insurrance. Somebody dies from overheated office and you want to sew the insurrer who enforced this ridiculous rules even on the third floor.. impossible, due to..
- rmoriz 2mo agoAnd the insurance conditions are based on DIN/EN, VDE, TÜV and others. If you have bodies that create rules, they will never stop creating rules because it is their job to create rules. Something that started great to reduce unnecessary harm became a red tape monster slowing down everything. Nobody gets elected or paid to reduce that in a sane manner (not: Chainsaw, Doge)
- rglullis 2mo agoBut it just goes to show how idiotic this culture of strict adherence to rules can be. I've been more than once been forced to sit on a bus for 10+ minutes, with the bus literally stopped by the sidewalk, and the driver still wouldn't budge when I said "I can just walk from here". It's feels worse than talking to a robot. At least I know robots have been programmed.
- rmoriz 2mo ago30 years ago, when the train broke down, you got a clear statement what happend and what will happening next. Nowadays everyone is treated like a small child. They just tell the obvious leaving the people hanging in uncertainty hence people get mad and question everything without understanding the cause (because they don’t get that information)
- beeforpork 2mo agoThe driver is not allowed to open the door anywhere but at a bus stop, the company running the bus forbids it. Quite strictly, actually. I think it is mainly because of insurance things. It is the same in a traffic jam when you are on the bus and the next bus stop is just a few meters away, and the bus is stuck and nothing moves -- impatient people will get angry because they want to leave the bus, but the driver is just not allowed to open the door except when the bus has properly reached the next bus stop. Some bus drivers do open the door on some such occasion, but they can really get into trouble if they are caught doing that.
- 14u2c 2mo agoIs it typical for a company to run the busses? Somewhat interesting as that's one thing in the US that is rarely privatized. The driver, etc. will be a direct employees of the municipality.
- klausa 2mo agoThey're usually private companies owned by the cities.
- master-lincoln 2mo agoCan something be private and owned by a state? Isn't the definition of private: non-public? And wouldn't the government in a democratic state count as public?
- klausa 2mo ago"Public company" is a very specific thing; the BVG is state owned, but very much not a public company.
- lotsofpulp 2mo agoIn the US, “public” can be short for a private business with publicly listed shares on a stock exchange anyone can buy, or public can mean an organization owned and operated by the government.
- lifestyleguru 2mo agoI laugh the same at their imploding automotive industry. Nothing ironic, nothing mean. They missed the stop and it's funny how they're not in the bus.
- la_fayette 2mo agolet's see how this turns out, but I would not underestimate the german engineering culture...
- wolfi1 2mo agoI'm waiting to see Siemens producing EV cars
- inatreecrown2 2mo agoThat would sure be interesting. Or maybe Bosch and Braun too.
- fifilura 2mo agoBosch already makes half of your car. Just their brand is not at the front.
- asdf88990 2mo agoThe German Engineering is a byproduct. The culture that created is also the one that is holding it from becoming competitive with Chinese automakers. Like almost everything, utility and efficiency is relative and dependent on the environment and external factors. People often overlook the “fit”.
- Propelloni 2mo agoThey said the same when Japanese car makers were trashing European and US manufacturers in the 1980s. Yet they adapted. Then they said the same when the South Koreans trashed them, yet they adapted. Now they say the same about the Chinese. Sure, past performance is no indicator of future performance, but all the doom-saying and hysterics are just that, fear of the unknown.
- lqet 2mo agoIf you get run over by a car or bicycle while trying to board a bus outside an official station, or if you trip, the bus company is liable, and the driver will be in very big trouble. Also, wehret den Anfängen! If they started doing this, it would set an example: it would make it very difficult to keep the schedule, and would invite people to just walk into traffic to busses stopping at a red light.
- wolfi1 2mo agoda könnte ja jeder kommen (then everony tries that, very loosely translated)
- Propelloni 2mo ago"Handle nur nach derjenigen Maxime, durch die du zugleich wollen kannst, dass sie ein allgemeines Gesetz werde." -- Immanuel Kant
- PfizerJaa 2mo ago[flagged]
- Propelloni 2mo agoHey newbie, I'm sorry my comment hurt you. But you don't have to be able to read German to apply the charity principle [1] and be a decent human being. Love you, too. [1] https://principle-of-charity.net/ https://principle-of-charity.net/
- PfizerJaa 2mo agoWhat kind of person comes to an English speaking forum, drops a quote in a foreign language without any translation and pretends to not get called out?
- OKRainbowKid 2mo ago
- spider-mario 2mo ago> Being French, I have a hard time understanding why you wouldn't. I too am French and I’m more puzzled by you than by the driver. Am I secretly German?
- hamper653 2mo ago> Am I secretly German? Probably.
- deleted 2mo ago[deleted]
- usrnm 2mo agoAre from the Alsace region or maybe your ancestors are? If so, maybe not so secretly
- Georgelemental 2mo ago100% Boche, désolé
- inatreecrown2 2mo agoThis was such an unusual thing for me coming from Germany to Italy. The Bus driver would stop at seemingly random places to pick up or drop people off. Once he stopped at the cafe to pick up his newspaper!
- tasuki 2mo ago> Once he stopped at the cafe to pick up his newspaper! The horrors!
- markvdb 2mo agoI once was in a train making an unscheduled stop in the middle of the fields. The driver picked up a colleague who stood waving next to the rails...
- ksk23 2mo agoGerman bus drivers sometimes stop to check the bins for leftover "Pfandpflaschen" (reusable beverage cans, 25 euro cents per)
- rsynnott 2mo agoWas this a comparable environment (big city vs big city, or rural vs rural)? This is a thing for rural services in Ireland (one type of service does this officially; you can ask them to pick you up at your house!), but very much not one for urban services, say.
- inatreecrown2 2mo agoGood point, and yes, the cities are comparable in population, around 100 - 200k.
- inatreecrown2 2mo agopopulation size, sorry.
- scotty79 2mo ago
- rmoriz 2mo agoIn Germany everything has rules and most things have mandatory insurance. It‘s usually not covered by insurance to stop outside of a bus stop to take passengers. Rudeness or inflexibility is mostly caused by rules to limit liability. Bus drivers are not allowed to drive backwards with passengers e.g on a road blockage. There are several stories about 30+ min delay until a second driver was summoned to help.
- KellyCriterion 2mo agoNo, it is because in Berlin you do not run for a bus and trying to get onboard if you missed it, you just wait for the next one which arrives usually a few min later, so yes, from a Berliners perspective, this is really wierd, because nobody does this usually :-)
- holowoodman 2mo agoYes, I'm also guessing it is a big-city vs. small-town thing. When the next bus is in 2h, then the driver feels your pain and maybe lets you in anyways...
- jpfromlondon 2mo ago[dead]
- paganel 2mo agoIf it counts no Bucharest bus driver would let you board at the semaphore either, they may not lough at you because they're generally too busy speaking with one of their friends on WhatsApp (via audio-call) or trying and navigate the crazy traffic in here, but for sure they won't open the doors for you. I would have expected for this to be a common thing all throughout Europe.
- juliendorra 2mo agoFor context in Paris (and probably other French cities) you would try that and the result would heavily depends on the driver and their mood of the day ! Because they too are not allowed to do it, but of course France is all about flexing the rules (a bit, not so much, and after some pleading)
- germanae 2mo ago[dead]
- throw85477 2mo agoThat’s entirely normal to me, a Pole. I wouldn’t even expect it to work any other way anywhere.
- pmg101 2mo agoMeanwhile, here in the UK we had the bus with no door at all that you could just jump on and off from in moving traffic. People trusted to manage their own risk. I remember this vividly from my childhood, in the 80s and 90s, in London. Not anymore though, sadly. https://www.ltmuseum.co.uk/blog/routemaster-design-icon https://www.ltmuseum.co.uk/blog/routemaster-design-icon
- rsynnott 2mo agoThey needed a two person crew, was the main problem, AIUI.
- dathinab 2mo agoBecause you did something very weird ;) - for insurance reasons it's not allowed for them to let you one once they "departed" from the curb, even if just by 20cm. They can literally lose their job over it and while it is a very exhausting job it doesn't pay that badly. (This wasn't always this way). - due to how Berlin has historically grown and the congestion issues that brought with it the buses have a hard time being on time(1) on the 6,589 bus stops across 152 (day) lines (~40-45 stops per line). So they try to avoid any additional delays, especially if this delay might cause them to miss a green light. (1): Berlins love to blame the public transportation provider(s) for this delays. And in some cases (S-Bahn) this is partially true, but for the busses it is much more on the "actual hard problem" side then for S-Bahn. And some of the other problems also go back to politics, like so often.
- auselen 2mo agoI arrived at fish selling place at 15:00, he was collecting fishes back. I laughed and said something like “oh I thought I missed closing time!”. No answer, waited a minute, still no answer, then I left :( (Sweden) I mean it isn’t the bus case, and I can understand the reasons, still may be put a sticker around telling the rules. But this kind of experience is there, no denying it…
- rsynnott 2mo agoHuh. I'm Irish; it would never occur to me to try this. Buses will sometimes delay departure if someone is visibly running for the stop, but that's as far as it goes. I think maybe France might be an outlier there. Honestly, opening the door in random places seems kind of unsafe. EDIT: As people are doing stories of public transport in different countries, here's mine. I was getting the BART in San Francisco carrying luggage. The driver _leaned out the window_ to warn me that this one wasn't going to the airport. As it happened, that was what I was going for; I was going elsewhere and then on to the airport later. But it was nice of her to check (and very unusual; don't think I've been anywhere else where train drivers interact with the public at all). Always think about that when I hear people complaining about San Francisco.
- mdnahas 2mo agoA German woman told me about her trip to Ireland: She tried to buy a bus ticket from the driver, like she did at home. But, in Ireland, you have to buy it at the station. The driver pulled up next to the station and said, “Run in there and buy you ticket quick! I’ll wait for you.” She did it in complete disbelief. “This would never happen in Germany!”, she said.
- ShinyLeftPad 2mo agoAt least he laughed instead of just ghosting you!
- gfrecvh 2mo agoIn London the driver looks forward and pretends he didn't see you.
- vldr 2mo agoIt may be because the bus gets priority on the green light and can't wait/pause again for extra passengers