S-Bahn

Ah, the

U-Bahn as opposed to the S-Bahn.

Yeah, the S-Bahn I used to get from the airport to Essen, and then I used the U train to get to Essen at the convention.

So I go down into the underground where the U train is, and it's so crowded...

That the platform is full.

So one's like a major one and one's a minor one.

So I don't mind doing the minor one on the U-Bahn, yeah? Or the S-Bahn.

But what I did find when I was going to work years ago, every time I meditated on the train, I'd open my eyes at the end and everybody's asleep.

I'm meditating, they're all falling asleep.

And there's another example as well.

The S-Bahn in Berlin had loads of problems around 2011 sort of time.

Significant numbers of trains on that network were just taken out of action again because of lack of maintenance.

And in fact, Martin, there's even a really direct TFL example here, which I dare say might come back and haunt us a little bit.

Like public trains?

Deutsche Bahn, S-Bahn, U-Bahn and that kind of stuff.

Yes, the dogs

are allowed.

Not only do you have BART, the Broad Gauge Great Society Metro, which I personally, from my own experience, think is very meh.

You also have Caltrain, which is a proper S-Bahn running from downtown San Francisco all the way to downtown San Jose, with then some select trains continuing onward to Gilroy.

But you also have the very large Muni light rail system running all throughout San Francisco itself, San Jose has a light rail system of its own, the much more bland and highly suburbanized VTA light rail.

There's the Altamont Corridor Express, which goes from San Jose all the way into Stockton and may actually be part of a future expansion of service, the Valley Link, I believe.

Uh-huh.

And I took the, uh, the S-Bahn, the train that goes around Berlin.

Who the fuck did you go and visit without telling me?

To get baby stuff.

This sentence asks someone to show you how to use a specific mobile app.

Can you show me how to use this app? Kannst du mir zeigen, wie man diese App verwendet? Ask this to understand what the local term S-Bahn means.

What does S-Bahn mean? Was bedeutet S-Bahn? You say this when looking for public toilets in stations or airports.

Where is the nearest restroom? Wo ist der nächste Toilettenraum? Use it to request a passport-sized photograph at a photo studio.

I need a passport photo.

Uh, the first one, I didn't even know this thing existed.

They wanna build four skyscrapers on that piece of land when you're taking the S-Bahn into Zo, there's a circus there right now.

Hmm.

Yeah, yeah.

Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.

But everywhere else is just hell.

Warschauer Straße, Warschauer Brücke, the S-Bahn, U-Bahn.

It's called Monster Ronsens.

They also used Stadler GTWs, but with a much more modified front end, whereas here they are stock standard European styling, which I actually kind of prefer a little bit.

GTWs are actually very common in Europe, primarily around the 2000s to 2010s for rural branchline service and even some small-city S-Bahn metro-style services.

On metro rail, these vehicles run exclusively alone in singles, as most platforms are actually only one vehicle long.

And one fun fact of note, these do actually have prominent buffers, which you're going to start to see on a lot of subsequent DMU systems, but these are not buffers as you would understand, like, in a British context, say.