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Berlin SAP TechEd - commute?

Former Member
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Several of us here in Germany are traveling to Berlin via different means and we began to think about sharing rides? The way I see it we have 3 major locations before getting to Berlin.

Munich

Frankfurt

Cologne

If anyone is interested in sharing rides, a bus, etc. please comment here so we can figure out how big of a demand there is and then see about the possibilities of organizing something (THIS IS US not SAP - just a bunch of community folks here not a company involved)

Craig

14 REPLIES 14

koehntopp
Product and Topic Expert
Product and Topic Expert
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I'd usually take a train or plane from Frankfurt, but if there's a bus that I can hop on that might be an alternative

Frank.

Nigel_James
Active Contributor
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Great initiative - James Governor and I will share a smart car as we drive over from London. (Not)

I will be flying in.

N

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London to Cologne is usually a decent connection?

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My wife and I will be driving from London to Berlin via Hamburg, and possibly Bruges, in our Skoda Octavia estate (@Craig: station wagon) car. If anyone wants anything heavy or liquid taken to/from London/Berlin, I'm sure we can oblige. I'm thinking beer, Club-Mate, etc. Who knows, I may even get to bring back a SAP Mentor backpack.

Cheers,

Darren

akpetteroe2
Active Participant
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I'm in!

Anne

Edited by: Anne Kathrine Petteroe on Aug 10, 2008 11:47 AM

Former Member
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Good initiative!

Slightly off-piste down south, so alternatives remains flying, car by myself or train.

Car-by-myself increase my theoretical CO2 dump ever so slightly.

Train would be good, and nice as long as I'm allowed space and a nice night cabin.

Ever tried finding a price for European travel by train online? Wow, that's in need of some better systems! Only approximately doable - but Antibes-Paris-Berlin seems to be best unless I keep on changing trains all night long all over the place...

Price though, ouch, about 7-900 u20AC instead of Easyjet at 150 u20AC. Too bad, I would love to go ta-tack-ta-tack through southern Europe with a good book in some nice dining car (Ok, sleeping sitting straight up on a 19 hour run while eating sandwiches out of a paper bag would lower it to about 500 u20AC, duh.)

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WOW. Great initiative. Small, green steps by individuals (who happen to be trend setters and thought leaders) is a wonderful way to go and go greener.

Let's think how to expand that so that the impact on others or others' thinking at the very least happens.

Who is going to write about this further and get more community awareness going? Eddy de Clerq has often inspired me with his approach. Craig and James G. got me looking up my CO2 weight. We have a new scientist on board from Business Objects who can give clear metrics around what we burn ...and save.

How to better "spread the word"?

By the way [Doppler has an extension|http://www.dopplr.com/traveller/me/carbon] to easily measure the culmination of your upcoming trips and I found a separate aggregation page for donating and offsetting. Perhaps this is the best approach as not only is it voluntary, but each person can decide which offsetting site works best for them (profit/non-profit, geographic)

[http://www.ecobusinesslinks.com/carbon_offset_wind_credits_carbon_reduction.htm|http://www.ecobusinesslinks.com/carbon_offset_wind_credits_carbon_reduction.htm]

For the States, one that looks promising and event oriented: [http://www.carbonfund.org/|http://www.carbonfund.org/]

For UK, one considered "gold standard" [http://www.carbonneutral.com/|http://www.carbonneutral.com/]

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I don't know if there is an English version of that specific site. My german was/is fairly poor, but I got through it ok.

Decent usability transcends language barriers.

There is another one that's in multiple languages including English. I will see if I can find it.

It is a bit of a strange feeling at first commuting with complete strangers. It can be fun though.

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Best place to find train prices and times for Europe is the German train site [Deutche Bahn -English|http://www.db.de/site/bahn/en/start.html]

If you are not from Europe, you can get really good deal using a Eurail pass. Unlimited or Limited travel for a set price. [http://www.eurail.com]

It covers most of the standard trains in Continental Western Europe as well as the fast ICE and TGV that do around 300kmph (but not the ICE Tilt) but you still have to get reservations in some countries like France. Note that reservations are different from tickets and are usually cheap. Maybe 10 Euro.

Edited by: Daniel Blackwell on Aug 14, 2008 12:45 PM

Edited by: Daniel Blackwell on Aug 14, 2008 12:47 PM

JimSpath
Active Contributor
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I will be taking a red-eye flight from Philadelphia to Frankfurt, arriving on 10-Oct. So far, I have several recommendations for "things to do, places to see" and I'm certainly open for more "people to meet". I need to get to Berlin by Sunday night to participate in Community Day Monday.

After TechEd, I have several personal days so am open to suggestions for sight-seeing before returning home. My original plan was to obtain a rail pass for 4 or 5 days and travel other places besides Berlin and Frankfurt.

Love this "ride share board" idea!

Jim

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And what about communicating or further raising awareness about Carbon Offsetting. [Eddy|http://www.grumpyoldman.be/category/environmental/] has been a tiny bit quiet lately on this front here but you certainly gave us food for thought a while back with your car rental blog if I recall....[Rented a car lately? Would you like carbon offsets with that?|https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/weblogs?blog=/pub/wlg/8839] [original link is broken] [original link is broken] [original link is broken];

Looking for feedback from those more expert about the various carbon offsetting websites.

Former Member
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How about [http://www.mitfahrgelegenheit.de/]?

Took a few rides when I was in Germany using this site.

450km in 3.5 hrs......

JimSpath
Active Contributor
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Daniel - can you add the link you cited to this wiki page, along with comments on how you used the site?

https://wiki.sdn.sap.com/wiki/display/CSR/Transportation+choices

Is there an English language version?

Thank you!

Jim

Former Member
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OK so I couldn't tell everyone ALL of my thinking since I needed to dot a few i's and cross a few t's before hand. That is now all done.

[SAP TechEd '08 Cluetrain|]