I'm arriving at Berlin Ostbahnhof on Wednesday evening and will be heading to Britz Hotel, but last year I learnt that the best way to get around the city is on a bicycle. Can you recommend a place (preferably near the station) where I could rent a not-so-small bike for 4 days for a reasonable price?
Thanks!

No personal experience, but

 http://www.yaambike.de/

sounds like an option.

On 4/19/2017 11:22 AM, Adrian Matoga wrote:
> I'm arriving at Berlin Ostbahnhof on Wednesday evening and will be heading to
> Britz Hotel, but last year I learnt that the best way to get around the city is
> on a bicycle. Can you recommend a place (preferably near the station) where I
> could rent a not-so-small bike for 4 days for a reasonable price?
> Thanks!


I personally found that the transit system in Berlin was excellent. You can buy a 3 day pass from the ticket machines, it's under "Tourist Fahrkarte" if I remember correctly.

On Wednesday, 19 April 2017 at 19:03:40 UTC, Fool wrote:
> No personal experience, but
>
>  http://www.yaambike.de/
>
> sounds like an option.

Looks good, thanks.

On Wednesday, 19 April 2017 at 20:13:52 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
> On 4/19/2017 11:22 AM, Adrian Matoga wrote:
>> I'm arriving at Berlin Ostbahnhof on Wednesday evening and will be heading to
>> Britz Hotel, but last year I learnt that the best way to get around the city is
>> on a bicycle. Can you recommend a place (preferably near the station) where I
>> could rent a not-so-small bike for 4 days for a reasonable price?
>> Thanks!
>
>
> I personally found that the transit system in Berlin was excellent. You can buy a 3 day pass from the ticket machines, it's under "Tourist Fahrkarte" if I remember correctly.

It is! In many discussions about public transport, Berlin is mentioned as an example that should be followed, and I must agree with that after a few rides I had.

On 4/20/17 1:29 AM, Adrian Matoga wrote:
> On Wednesday, 19 April 2017 at 20:13:52 UTC, Walter Bright wrote:
>> On 4/19/2017 11:22 AM, Adrian Matoga wrote:
>>> I'm arriving at Berlin Ostbahnhof on Wednesday evening and will be
>>> heading to
>>> Britz Hotel, but last year I learnt that the best way to get around
>>> the city is
>>> on a bicycle. Can you recommend a place (preferably near the station)
>>> where I
>>> could rent a not-so-small bike for 4 days for a reasonable price?
>>> Thanks!
>>
>>
>> I personally found that the transit system in Berlin was excellent.
>> You can buy a 3 day pass from the ticket machines, it's under "Tourist
>> Fahrkarte" if I remember correctly.
>
> It is! In many discussions about public transport, Berlin is mentioned
> as an example that should be followed, and I must agree with that after
> a few rides I had.
>

After the bike tour I had last year, I can 100% agree that having a bike is a fabulous way to get around the city quickly. You can ride the subway with your bike (although IIRC, you need to buy a ticket for it), but the thing that makes Berlin so accessible via bike is that it's totally flat. Those 10 minute walks become 1 minute rides, and it's a very bike-friendly city. I mused while riding around that the tour would be nearly impossible, or at least a huge workout if we did something like that in Boston :)

That being said, as a non-German speaker, I have no idea where the best place to rent a bike is. David Eckhardt figured it all out and negotiated with the bike shop that he found right down the street from the Ibis. This is after I walked a couple miles to 2 different bike shops to find out they were all sold out. I know there are places to rent bikes from an automated machine, then you can return them to one of those machines, but not sure if there are any in the area Dconf is happening.

Glad you are coming, Adrian, looking forward to seeing you again!

-Steve

On 19 April 2017 at 20:22, Adrian Matoga via Digitalmars-d <digitalmars-d@puremagic.com> wrote:
> I'm arriving at Berlin Ostbahnhof on Wednesday evening and will be heading
> to Britz Hotel, but last year I learnt that the best way to get around the
> city is on a bicycle. Can you recommend a place (preferably near the
> station) where I could rent a not-so-small bike for 4 days for a reasonable
> price?
> Thanks!
>

Almost every single bike shop you stumble across in Berlin offers rentals, all pretty much at the same price of around 10€ a day.  If you have a native german to help you, maybe you'll even get a swindled deal.

However, the one notable thing that has changed from last year is that there's a new competitor in the form of a Lidl bike.  I've seen literally hundreds of them inside the Berlin S-bahn ring, one major advantage of using them is that they don't need a dedicated docking station for you to park them in.

I'll just refer to this blog on the more fine grain details.

https://schnaeppchenfuchs.com/news/lidl-bike-berlin

Looks like they even come with a GPS locator, which probably is used for DB's smartphone app.

https://www.lidl-bike.de/de/rad-finden

Iain.

On Friday, 21 April 2017 at 16:49:36 UTC, Iain Buclaw wrote:
> On 19 April 2017 at 20:22, Adrian Matoga via Digitalmars-d <digitalmars-d@puremagic.com> wrote:
>> I'm arriving at Berlin Ostbahnhof on Wednesday evening and will be heading
>> to Britz Hotel, but last year I learnt that the best way to get around the
>> city is on a bicycle. Can you recommend a place (preferably near the
>> station) where I could rent a not-so-small bike for 4 days for a reasonable
>> price?
>> Thanks!
>>
>
> Almost every single bike shop you stumble across in Berlin offers rentals, all pretty much at the same price of around 10€ a day.  If you have a native german to help you, maybe you'll even get a swindled deal.
>
> However, the one notable thing that has changed from last year is that there's a new competitor in the form of a Lidl bike.  I've seen literally hundreds of them inside the Berlin S-bahn ring, one major advantage of using them is that they don't need a dedicated docking station for you to park them in.
>
> I'll just refer to this blog on the more fine grain details.
>
> https://schnaeppchenfuchs.com/news/lidl-bike-berlin
>
> Looks like they even come with a GPS locator, which probably is used for DB's smartphone app.
>
> https://www.lidl-bike.de/de/rad-finden

Good idea, I'll try to find one before I look for some "traditional" rental. I'm only afraid that as a sort of public bikes they're all in a "normalized" size which probably won't be safe for me – I sometimes ride nextbike bikes here in Warsaw (this year they look exactly the same as in Berlin) and they kill my knees very quickly.

I really wanted to take my own bike but the train operator sucks – there's only one train in the timetable that allows bicycles and it's at 6am and costs twice as much as the one in the afternoon.

On Friday, 21 April 2017 at 13:37:17 UTC, Steven Schveighoffer wrote:
>
> After the bike tour I had last year, I can 100% agree that having a bike is a fabulous way to get around the city quickly. You can ride the subway with your bike (although IIRC, you need to buy a ticket for it), but the thing that makes Berlin so accessible via bike is that it's totally flat. Those 10 minute walks become 1 minute rides, and it's a very bike-friendly city. I mused while riding around that the tour would be nearly impossible, or at least a huge workout if we did something like that in Boston :)

I don't know about Boston, but I've heard many times that Lisbon was too hilly to ride a bike there, but in reality it wasn't all that bad (well, maybe on the hottest summer days), and in recent years the city council has been investing in dedicated infrastructure to improve it. I guess people will always find excuses. :)
Warsaw, where I live now, is almost just as flat as Berlin and quite pleasant to ride around, especially in spring and summer (I rarely choose the shortest way home), but it's not as bike-friendly yet for other reasons. Cities like Berlin are a live explanation of the term "critical mass" – there's just enough people on bikes so they're treated as normal and respected in the streets, unlike in Polish cities where riding to work is still considered eccentric and casual cyclists are thought of as traffic obstacles, members of leftist sects, or just too poor to own a car.

> Glad you are coming, Adrian, looking forward to seeing you again!

Yeah, can't wait to hear your talk on iopipe! :)

On 4/21/2017 2:10 PM, Adrian Matoga wrote:
> I don't know about Boston, but I've heard many times that Lisbon was too hilly
> to ride a bike there, but in reality it wasn't all that bad (well, maybe on the
> hottest summer days),

I grew up in Phoenix, and rode my bike everywhere. It's completely flat, so you'd think it'd be easy. But there was always a wind, and biking upwind is worse than biking up a hill.

Many times I idly thought about rigging a sail on my bike.