Thoughts on Public Transport
Europe has a pretty incredible public transport system. In Western and Central Europe, you can travel nearly everywhere by train, and the trains are reliable, clean, and efficient. Buses are also plentiful — from getting around inside big cities, to getting to small villages in the country side, there are usually buses available. Granted, the frequency for public transport varies, but if you’re not on a tight or strict schedule, it is super convenient for travelling around. So, I’ve been using a lot of public transport this summer.
Using public transport in a country where you don’t speak the language (like Italy), to go to places you’ve never been before, however, is not always easy. Sometimes you can’t buy bus tickets on the actual bus, so you need to find out where they do sell bus tickets. Trains will often have several ticket options, not just 1st or 2nd class, and it can be hard to decipher what ticket you need, when the ticket machine is in a different language. Not to mention, the very real possibility of stepping onto the wrong bus or train, or getting off at the wrong stop on the right bus or train, and being totally lost, especially when you don’t have wifi or data.
For all these reasons, I get pretty nervous about travelling with public transport, but as a result of this nervousness, and through experience, I’ve learned a few rules for using public transport in countries where you don’t speak the language. In this post, I will share my five “rules” for using public transport in countries where you don’t speak the language, specifically Italy. (Disclaimer: these aren’t real rules so much as lessons I’ve learnt but am writing out as rules because I think it sounds nice.)
Rule #1: Follow your route on a map app on your phone. The best way to know that you are going in the right direction, when you don’t know your surroundings, is to track yourself on a map. One day, at the beginning of the summer, I was taking the bus back from work, when the bus completely missed the town I needed to stop at, even though it was technically a stop the bus should’ve made. I only noticed because I was tracking the route, and saw that we took a turn before my stop. If I hadn’t done that I may only have noticed at the very end of the line, and the walk back would’ve been much longer. I no longer take that bus, but moral of the story is: follow your route.
Rule #2: Talk to bus drivers. The people who can help you most when you’re taking the bus are the drivers. They can help with figuring out tickets and ensuring you’re on the right bus, and usually they’re willing to help if you’re a bit prepared. When you step on it helps to ask if they’re going in the right direction by saying your destination. If you’re not sure how to pronounce your destination have it written down on a piece of paper and show it to the driver. It’s also really useful to learn the phrase “where can i buy a ticket?” in the language of the country, in case you can’t buy it on the bus. Both of these were really useful for me when I was in Ancona, where the same bus number has different routes and you have to buy bus tickets in tobacco shops.
Rule #3: In big train stations, buy train tickets at the help desk. At small train stations, it is usually pretty simple, because either there is a small ticket desk, which is operated by someone who doesn’t speak English so will get you the easiest ticket that does what you need, or there are ticket machines, which have an English option and don’t have many ticket options. At big train stations, there are usually many different types of trains that there are far more options for tickets. This past weekend, I was going from Milan to Gavirate, and thought since I’d taken the trip before, I could just use the ticket machine. After entering my destination and selecting 2nd class, I was given 4 options (none of which had easy-to-understand names) with drastically different prices. Fines for wrong tickets can be pretty high in Europe, so I gave up and went to the help desk, which took 2 minutes and was much easier.
Rule #4: For long journeys, set an alarm. It’s pretty easy when you’re on a 2+ hour journey to miss your stop because you’re sleeping, looking at the views, or just generally preoccupied. Those are usually also the journeys where missing your stop is worse than usual, because the distance between stops is much greater. I always Google the expected travel time to my destination before the journey, and set an alarm for a few minutes before, so I’m sure I’m awake and ready to get off when I need to.
Rule #5: Don’t trust Google for time tables. Google is an incredible tool that can help you in many many ways, but public transport time tables in Europe isn’t always one of them. If you can, go to stations themselves to find out what schedule for buses or trains are. Usually they are posted somewhere visible, and are much more reliable. One time, I was travelling from Varese to Gavirate, and Google said there wasn’t going to be a train for another two hours. After half an hour, I was quite tired, so I went to the station to double check the times, and Google hadn’t shown two trains that ran in the time it said there were none.
Despite the fact that I get pretty nervous about travelling with public transport, I really do appreciate the public transport system in Italy and Europe as a whole. It is seriously great for getting around big cities, going between cities (or towns), and even travelling to other countries. I would not have been able to travel as easily and as much as I have so far this summer without public transport. Nonetheless, I always keep these five “rules” in mind, just to be safe.
