Good morning #TrainBubble #BahnBubble 👋 This week I'll be in the Netherlands, and planning to do a bit of scouting about the #CyclingOnRails situation in the area (without bicycle but with the photo equipment 📸). Anything I should be aware of? Any recommendations?
Benelux is one of the remaining blind spots on my map to bring your bicycle on board of trains, so I'm also planning to pass by Belgium and Luxembourg on my way back 📸 https://cycling-on-rails.com/train-bicycle-guide/
So I ended up checking some trains straight after arriving in Utrecht as I'm told Dutch stations are all cordoned off by ticket gates.
Starting with the soon deprecated "Koploper" ICM. Funny front shape with a driver cabin above what used to be a corridor to allow coupling 2 trains together.
I didn't find the bicycle spots (edit: see the replies for where to find them). And a weird definition of wheelchair accessible: just a wheelchair logo but the same flight of stairs.
Next up the VIRM double-deckers. Dutch trains like funny shapes. 🙃 A bit hard to enter during rush hour, unless you go in the counter-flow direction!
Then the Sprinters, this time with generous mixed-use space and at-grade boarding. 💯
I watched @notjustbikes 's video about Dutch brick street design last night, so I had to put it in practice in my walk around: https://youtube.com/watch?v=Cq1kV6V_jvI
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And the Amsterdam-Frakfurt ICE from Deutsche Bahn, with 8 bicycle spots in second class, this time marked as such on the displays! 🙌
#CyclingOnRails #FietsInDeTrein #FahrradMitnahme #CrossBorderRail #a11y
And now a little sub-thread about the bicycle garage at Utrecht's Central Station. One cannot write about cycling & rails in the Netherlands without mentioning it!
The main garage open in 2019 has 12500 parking spots, making it the largest in the world! See the official description on the city's website: https://www.utrecht.nl/city-of-utrecht/mobility/cycling/bicycle-parking/bicycle-parking-stationsplein
Obviously, bringing this many bicycles on board trains wouldn't scale for commuter traffic, even if trains suddenly had 100 bicycle spots each.
Some 22,000 high-quality bicycle parking places will be realised at the largest public-transport hub in the Netherlands. In the new Utrecht Central Station area, near the public-transport terminal, these parking places will be divided over five large bicycle parking
To me, the most impressive part is how this bicycle parking blends into the landscape. It's 3 floors deep, just under the main station's plazza between the station building and a mall.
If you don't know it's there, you won't notice it. Which is a testament to how dense bicycles are! #Utrecht
To give an idea of the scale: there are 3 floors, with 30-ish rows each, and the longest rows can store up to 250 bicycles if I counted correctly (check my math on the pictures!)
There is also a separate section for bicycles with panniers or children seats, and public bicycle rentals. However, all the rental bicycles were gone when I checked, so a few people queued to wait for more bicycles.
Unfortunately, it seems that only bicycles that conform with the standard shape are allowed here. No tandems, no cargo bikes, etc.
Another important feature is the live system showing the number of free spots per row, and extends to street signs even further away in town. A core aspect of accessibility!
It's free if you're there under 24 hours. So you're just checking out most of the time, not paying. The "free" bit is typical for these fietsenstallings.
Fun fact: there often isn't much space left during the business day. When the Jaarbeursplein fietsenstalling was temporarily closed last winter, this fietsenstalling was always completely full during the day. It was nuts.
@cycling_on_rails @notjustbikes And the new Renault 4 that MyWheels introduced in Amsterdam. On the first picture with the KGB license plate.
Got a €10 discount code by e-mail for it yesterday: RENAULT4
Apparently the thing also serves as a battery for the electricity grid.
Cycling on Rails
Ted Lemon
Alix Guillard
ReindeR Rustema