Getting Around in Luneburg

We came to Germany with no intention of having a car and, so far, we have gotten along just fine without one. Since we left Columbus, we have ridden on planes, buses, trains, and even two ferry rides, but I have been in a car only eight times in the past six weeks, including the airport taxi upon our arrival.  The kids have been in cars fewer times and Tom several more.

I have already blogged about some of our experiences with the public buses regarding the girls' transportation back and forth to school.  As of about two weeks ago, they have been riding without incident without my needing to accompany them at all.  They ride together to school, including a transfer at the train station, with A getting off two stops before R.  In the afternoon, they usually come home at different times, riding solo all the way.  On Friday afternoon, following our move to a new house, they each rode home on a new bus route alone.  I met them at the bus stop, to make sure they got off at the right stop - R and I had a trial run the day before, but it was the first time for A.  I am so proud of both of them!

As for me, I have renewed my monthly pass and take the bus several times a week to run errands.  I have ridden the bus more times in the past six weeks than I have ridden in the past six years - perhaps even the last 16 years!  Most of the bus routes I use have buses that come by every 20 minutes most of the day, 30 minutes on Saturdays, and less frequently on Sunday.  Within the city limits, you really aren't far from a bus line.  People of all kinds ride the bus: children on their way to school, parents running errands with their small children, elderly, commuters, people with disabilities, and teens.  I have seen people bring their dogs on the bus; not just little toy dogs smuggled on in handbags, but REAL dogs on leashes sitting at their owner's feet.  People bring on their strollers, walkers, shopping baskets, and, if the driver gives the Okay, bikes.

The buses are usually on time.  In the time I have been here, I have only had one bus not show up and one that was more than five minutes late.  I had one bus pass me by because I had been daydreaming and failed to look up in time to make eye contact with the driver and step forward as it approached.  I learned my lesson!

In addition to riding the bus, I have been walking A LOT!  Usually I am pushing a loaded stroller or carrying something.  I walk to the bus stop.  I walk to the grocery store.  I walk around the market square and downtown. Sometimes I unintentionally take long walks looking for my destination. If waiting for the bus would take about as much time as walking to my destination, I often choose to walk.

This is a big change for me and one that I came to Germany hoping to make a new habit.  I do not walk much at home in the US.  Although I claim walking to be my exercise of choice, I admittedly don't make much, if any, time for it.  I am always in so much of a hurry back home and my schedule is so full, that I use that as an excuse to hop in the car for a trip to the neighborhood recreation center or even the grocery store two blocks away.  It is amazing to me now, when I consider waiting 20 minutes for the bus or walking 20 minutes, that I suddenly have plenty of time to take that walk for a distance that back home I would consider too far!

We have all been walking more and have changed our ideas of how far is too far to walk.  This was really evident on a Sunday morning a few weeks ago when we were on our way to catch a train.  In our planning, we failed to realize that the bus in our neighborhood didn't start running until almost noon on Sundays, so we needed to walk to a further bus stop-about 15 minutes.  Our pace and timing was such that we arrived at the bus stop more than 10 minutes before the bus was due.  At that point, the girls urged enthusiastically that we should just walk the rest of the way to the train station, another 15-20 minutes.  We really enjoyed the walk through the quiet streets, usually bustling with traffic, and actually getting to see the interesting architecture of buildings we had only briefly noticed through the window of a bus.

And now, as of  Friday, I have a third means of transport, a bike!  A friend of a friend offered me a bike when we visited them last weekend. I am finding that people seem to have plenty of spare bikes.  Not that they aren't riding a bike themselves; this is an extra bike, in addition to the bikes that each member of the family uses regularly.  Of the four bikes we own at home, only one gets used almost daily (by Tom) and the rest sit idle for months, if not years.

Here, bikes are a way of life.  A traditional gift for a 2 year old is a walking bike: a small bike without wheels which teaches the child to balance and steer first, before they move up to a traditional bike.  I have seen toddlers all over the place with these bikes! ( I am very tempted to buy one for O)  All major roads have either a designated bike lane or the sidewalk with a separate bike lane.  Bikes are required to have a bell - to signal to pedestrians to get out of the way! - and working front and rear lights.  At intersections without a traffic light, bikes often only slow down and it is the cars that stop to make way!  I have seen all kinds of people riding bikes: kids on their way to school, commuters, moms with kids and full baskets, mail carriers, courriers, and the elderly. I have read that it is a saying in Germany that "There is no bad weather for riding a bike, only bad clothing".

Contrast this with my neighborhood at home, which actually has a high number of bikers because it has a major (the only) bike route running along the river.  Tom rides his bike to work daily except December through February when the bike path is covered in snow and/or ice.  The path doesn't get plowed and he feels the street is not a safe alternative for bikers.  In one particular section of the route, two blocks from our home, bikers must leave the path and drive on about a 1/4 mile stretch of neighborhood streets, including a busy intersection.  Last summer, the city attempted to make the intersection safer for bikers by adding a bike lane approaching the intersection, forbidding a right turn on red, and added a "bike zone" where bikers could wait safely for the light to change and be seen by drivers rather than risking waiting in a blind spot.  Boy did that stir up complaints from our non-biking neighbors!

One of the things I pondered in my early weeks of commuting by bus and foot, was how all the bikes, pedestrians, and autos seem to weave around each other so effortlessly and fearlessly. Buses and cars seem to wait patiently for, and be courteous of, pedestrians and bikes, yet they also keep a much shorter distance than I would see in the US.  No sooner has a bike gotten out of the way (yet still on the road), than the bus is turning into the lane. Early on, I observed that you cannot be timid when approaching an intersection on foot.  If there is not a light at the crossing, you proceed, with a degree of caution, but with a degree of assertiveness as well.  What I came to realize is that here drivers are so accustomed to having all of this pedestrian and bicycle traffic, that they are alert and aware and all concerned have learned to move amongst each other in such a way that it is all very smooth and safe.

Back to "my" bike.  It is a sturdy, heavy, city bike-built to withstand the cobblestone streets.  I brought the bike "home" to our first rental, first on the train and then on the bus (I had R with me, so I couldn't ride it).  I retrieved it from our rental on Saturday and rode it for the first time into town to the market. Now, it has been at least since last summer that I last rode a bike and I was feeling a little intimidated by the whole biking environment.  But, at tricky intersections (like the round-about!), I watched how others navigated their way through and then put on my best game face and went for it.  It was pretty exciting to be zooming along routes I had been walking for the past six weeks!  Very quickly I was in the city center and looking for a parking spot among the dozens of bikes along each block leading to the pedestrian-only center.

My first stop was the bike shop where I purchased a basket to put on the rear rack.  It is one that clips on easily and has a handle so it can be used as a market basket.  After the morning shopping, I rode 2.7 miles to our new place - with a full shopping bag in the basket and a backpack with 2 kilos of potatoes, 2 kilos of apples, and 10 oranges!  Ta dah!