How to fuck up an airport • Hacker News Board

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#261

Post by mqus » Mon, Jul 04, 2022, 8:25 AM UTC

3D30497420 wrote: post #258

enlyth wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was just there over this weekend, they sold us those 9 eur train tickets saying you can use it for any train anywhere. Then we board the first train that Apple Maps suggested and the first thing we hear from the announcer "9 eur tickets are not valid on this train".

Was the train from BER? I'm pretty sure any train from BER airport would be covered under the 9-euro ticket. The trains not covered under the ticket are primarily ICE (inter-city high speed) and anything operated by another company (e.g. FlixTrain).

ICs to Dresden/Rostock also go from there.

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#262

Post by nix23 » Mon, Jul 04, 2022, 8:26 AM UTC

>Employees were busy stealing copper instead of fixing the fire system. Some managers got rich taking bribes. Informers had their coffee poisoned.

I really don't get it why Berlin and Moscow don't get along very well, it's essentially the same. But Moscow is less dirty.

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#263

Post by klohto » Mon, Jul 04, 2022, 8:33 AM UTC

ginko wrote: post #47

franze wrote: post #26

I just landed in BER 20 minutes ago and I am just amazed how bad the signage is The signs tiny and all in the same red/white color. The monitors tiny and sparse. The placement of the tickets for the trains placed where you do not pass. And just good luck if you go down the wrong stairway and then reached the nowhere, without any visible signs. They cared about the CI way more than about fast passenger throughput.

>They cared about the CI way more than about fast passenger throughput. Continuous integration?

Canine Implants

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#264

Post by realityking » Mon, Jul 04, 2022, 9:02 AM UTC

bobthepanda wrote: post #256

p_l wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's something that might trip people up, but due to West/East Germany split and Interflug going under after unification, Berlin airports are peripheral - leaves in flight graph, not hubs except for low cost airlines. Lufthansa continues to use Munich and Frankfurt as hubs.

Also as part of the legacy of the split, Berlin is the only EU capital that has a lower GDP per capita than the country.

According to Wikipedia, this was no longer true in 2019 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_German_states_by_GRP_p...

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#265

Post by MagnumOpus » Mon, Jul 04, 2022, 9:24 AM UTC

te_chris wrote: post #253

f_allwein wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

an interesting exception is Munich airport, which was originally designed to minimise the distance passengers have to take to reach their plane. Well visible here: https://www.theconstructionindex.co.uk/assets/news_articles/... Say you arrive by taxi, you would go down the street in the middle, drop off at one of the four check-in areas (the triangular structures), then make your way through check-in and security and…

In my experience all German airports are terrible, particularly Munich and BER.

Terrible is relative. Never been to BER, but FRA is far better than similar-sized European/US airports like LHR or LAX (though a far cry from best like Changi, Chek Lap Kok or Dubai), and the smaller international airports like STR or FKB are quick to traverse and comparatively easy to access.

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#266

Post by odiroot » Mon, Jul 04, 2022, 9:24 AM UTC

ivan_gammel wrote: post #246

odiroot wrote: post #7

Best way: close the actual city airport that was functioning like a well-oiled machine and was loved by the city population. Even better, do it against their explicit wishes with a shady decision that reeks of corruption. Any follow-up to that will always end up being "fucked up".

The people of Pankow cannot agree with you. The noise from Tegel was a torture.

And yet the people from Reinickendorf and Spandau, who were more affected, voted for it to stay. Go figure.

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#267

Post by FourthProtocol » Mon, Jul 04, 2022, 9:26 AM UTC

soco wrote: post #257

fdhsbjasvh wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Schiphol is insane. I had the same thing happen to me a few months ago. Figured I’d go 5 hrs early just in case. Even without check bags I still missed my flight. I went 7 hrs early the next day and just made it due to departure delays. From what I heard they’re not letting people in until 5 hrs before their departure as the airport became too crowded.

I arrived in Heathrow yesterday 2.5 hours before my flight to a huge queue stretching outside the terminals into the parking lots. Mortifying to see. To my surprise I was past security in about an hour.

I was in that self same queue and also made it through surprisingly quick, only for my flight to Frankfurt being cancelled. Back at LHR now for round two.

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#268

Post by RalfWausE » Mon, Jul 04, 2022, 9:57 AM UTC

da39a3ee wrote: post #139

Germany doesn't traditionally have a reputation for incompetence. It sounds like this podcast gives many proximate reasons for this project's failure. What are the ultimate reasons?

"Dit is Berlin!"

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#269

Post by thecopy » Mon, Jul 04, 2022, 10:06 AM UTC

rob74 wrote: post #182

ubaltaci wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1) Why though? FEX is really nice, fast and have only couple of stops, it reaches to central station around 30min.

Yup, 50 € sounds like a lot of money for a few minutes saved (not to mention that it depends on the traffic situation if you will actually save some time). Of course, depending on where your hotel is and how many bags you have, a taxi may still be the better option...

After arriving in a new city is it very mentally relaxing not having to understand ticketing pricing, zones, best way to navigate, understanding the differences between different types of trains/trams/buses.

Especially since airport city is almost always a separate system as well than intra-city transport.

Re: How to fuck up an airport

#270

Post by enlyth » Mon, Jul 04, 2022, 10:24 AM UTC

WHA8m wrote: post #247

enlyth wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was just there over this weekend, they sold us those 9 eur train tickets saying you can use it for any train anywhere. Then we board the first train that Apple Maps suggested and the first thing we hear from the announcer "9 eur tickets are not valid on this train".

would be interesting to hear from a foreign how '9 euro ticket' sounds to you. Any opinions on that?

It was a nice option to have, because normally it seems we would've paid like 50 euros or something to get around for three days. But it was weird that the tickets reset on the 1st of the month, so we had to buy two of them because of unlucky timing.