Things to know

Organisation of Budapest's public transportation

Rules of thumb - without warranty

Most of the public transportation means in and around Budapest are operated by the BKV or better: BKV ZRt. (Budapesti Közlekedési Zártkörű Részvénytársaság). Read: trams, subways, trolleybuses, the cogwheel railway, the funicular to the Castle District, the Zugliget - János-hegy chair lift, the HÉV - which are interurban/local/vicinal railways -, and a few boat routes. And buses. But not all buses.

Suburban/interurban buses are operated by the VOLÁNBUSZ/VOLÁN companies - these are most of the times yellow, but sometimes not (white seems to be a new standard among subcontractors of VOLÁNBUSZ). These services have separate stops, that are sometimes close to the BKV bus stops. Yes, you've guessed it: there's no joint fare system! The case is similar with trains: "big" trains are operated by MÁV (Magyar Államvasutak), and they've also got their own independent fare system. The only step taken into the right direction was the introduction of the "Budapest passes", which are valid on BKV, VOLÁNBUSZ and MÁV services within the administrative boundaries of Budapest. Still, a BKV ticket is only valid on a BKV vehicle, a MÁV ticket is only valid on a MÁV train, and a VOLÁNBUSZ ticket is only valid on a VOLÁNBUSZ bus.

To the left: most of BKV's buses are blue with stripes of other colors. However, their Ikarus low-floor buses and a few special lines carry special liveries, like the "silver arrow" (nickname of this livery) on the picture to the right.

To make things a bit more complicated, there are a few small companies operating local/interurban bus (mainly shuttle) services, which are not necessarily part of the BKV fare system. And two larger companies (VT Transmann and Nógrád Volán) also operate bus routes for the BKV. Even more interestingly, tram supplementation services are sometimes also operated by VOLÁNBUSZ, with their yellow buses - but these are of course usable with BKV tickets/passes.

Playing with colors. To the left: a yellow VOLÁNBUSZ bus. To the right: blue BKV buses with yellow route plates are tram supplement services.

About zones: there's no real zone fare system in Budapest. Or better: the whole city is one big zone, and what goes out of that zone, is in another zone. If you cross the city limits, you enter the "outer zone". Only bus lines and the Szentendre/Gödöllő/Csömör/Ráckeve HÉV services leave the inner zone, trams don't. Since this page deals mostly with trams, this cames handy: if you have a valid one-day/tourist/seven-day/etc ticket or a monthly pass, you should be okay :-)

About season/day/week/etc passes on "special" services: these are not valid on the chair lift, the funicular and the BKV boats. Please take a look at the BKV's website (see link below) and see what kind of tickets/passes exist, and what is best for you:
[BKV TICKETS AND PASSES]

Tickets are only valid after you have validated it with the puncher (be it manual or automatic). Controllers (ticket inspectors) can ask for your ticket or pass anywhere and anytime on the vehicle and on BKV property (e.g. on a subway station). They can be recognised from a badge and an armband. If you have a valid pass or ticket, you should be fine, otherwise you might get into a bit of trouble, because most of the ticket inspectors don't speak foreign languages. Read the exact details:
[BKV Travel Conditions]

Now the important links - please only believe these, and not what you find on this page - I don't have the time to do regular updates, so I might be outdated, while the BKV website should be not.

[BKV Ticket Offices]
[BKV Tram Schedules]
[BKV Trolleybus Schedules]
[BKV HÉV Schedules]
[BKV Metro Schedules]
[BKV Bus Schedules]
[Funicular - boat - cogwheel railway - chair lift schedules]
[BKV Night Schedules]

VOLÁNBUSZ (local/interurban buses):
[VOLÁNBUSZ Schedules]

MÁV (Hungarian State Railways):
[Elvira - MÁV online schedules]

BKV route designations

The numbering scheme of Budapest public transportation underwent big changes recently: until autumn 2008 trams were numbered between 1 and 69, trolley buses between 70 and 89, while buses could bear any number between 1 and 297, even those used by tram or trolley bus routes. Now one number identificates only one service, for example there's the tram line 6, while the former bus service 6 was renumbered to 206.

Express services are marked by an added "E" after the basic route number, for example the bus line 240E is an express working of bus line 240, having fewer stops then the basic service.

Tram supplementation services are marked with an added "V" behind the number (i.e. "19V"). Their destination signs should also be yellow instead of white, but on one hand they often forget about this tradition, on the other hand dot-matrix displays cannot render yellow backgrounds behind route numbers, so mainly you should be looking out for that letter "V"!

Route designations with a number and a letter, e.g. 37A, 87A are insection services: mainly short and/or slightly altered and/or peak-hour workings of the original route.

VOLÁNBUSZ bus services have only started to become numbers recently, in the regime between 300 and 899.

Nightly bus services are numbered in the 900er regime, i.e. 906.

Update, 2008: The vendor of the visual passenger information system used on many BKV vehicles went bankrupt recently, therefore you will see many broken/non-functioning displays, especially on buses. As a "kind of" solution (quite typical for Budapest, unfortunately) new number/destination plates were manufactured, but on most vehicles there was no proper place for them anymore, so they're just thrown behind the windshield. This looks rather forlorn, and because the city has spent most of its money on the construction of the M4 metro line, I don't think the BKV will be able to replace all that equipment, so the chaos will remain for a while, I fear...

HÉV services have no numbers, they are referred to by their destinations.
For example: the "Csepel Line" goes to Csepel.
Insection services: for example the "Szentendre Line" goes to Szentendre, but there are also short courses on the same tracks that only go halfways, to Békásmegyer. Watch out for the destination sign on the front of the train, and/or the timeplan.

There are three metro (subway, underground, U-Bahn - call it as you like:) routes.
M1 or Yellow Line is the Milleneum Subway or "Shallow Subway Line", mostly referred to as "kisföldalatti" ("small subway"). This is the classic underground tramway line built in 1896 and extended in 1973.
M2 or Red Line, also referred to as "keleti-nyugati vonal" ("east-west line"): opened in two steps in 1970 and 1972.
M3 or Blue Line, also referred to as "észak-déli vonal" ("north-south line"): opened in many steps between 1972 and 1989.
There's no M4 yet, but you might see some placards for it that look just like line maps.

To the left: a "normal" tram stop notice-board. To the right: an orange notice-board with warnings for changes in the traffic.

A remark about detours, changes in the timeplan or route: if you see orange/yellow signs or notice-boards in the stops, they usually draw attention to some kind of alteration in the traffic. Or they might be just a forecast for changes, you must find out by looking for dates on the notice-board. During big detours however, you can see warning signs in english, too.

A few important words in hungarian

The hungarian language is hard to learn, because it's different to most other european languages - so I won't try to teach you how to conversate. At the end of this paragraph you can find a couple of links, if you want to try that - meanwhile I'd go for a few public transportation oriented and everyday terms.

Let's start with names of places:
"út" (ew-th) = road, street
"utca" (ew-th-za) = street (usually a smaller one than an "út")
"tér" (t-ehr) = square, sometimes used as "tere" as in "Örs vezér tere", which is in posessive case, meaning "Square of Örs vezér"
"körút" (cur-ew-th) = boulevard, circuit
"köz" (cuh-zh) = alley
"város" (wah-rosh) = city, town
"városi" (wah-rosh-y) = municipal, urban
"híd" (heed) = bridge
"sziget" (sig-at) = island
"hegy" (headj) = hill, mountain
"szálloda" (sah-ll-ow-da) or "szálló" (sah-l-low) = hotel

Now, the names of the transportation means and related things:
"kocsi" (coach-y) = car, coach, waggon; in fact "coach" is one of the very few words coming to english from hungarian: Kocs ("coach") was a village where a new, faster and lighter type of cart was first built
"pótkocsi" (pawt-coach-y) = trailer, trailing car (even if it's in the middle of a train:)
"motorkocsi" (mowtor-coach-y) = railcar, motorcar
"metró" (metr-oh) = subway, underground railway, metro
"villamos" (will-ah-mosh) = tram
"trolibusz" (trawlly-boos) = trolley bus
"busz" (boos) = bus
"HÉV" (hey-v) = abr. for "helyiérdekű vasút" = vicinal railway
"vonat" (wo-not) = train
"vasút" (w-ash-ewt) = railway, railroad
"vonal" (wo-nahl) = line, route
"járat" (yah-rawt) = route, service
"szerelvény" (cer-al-weh-nj) = set (as in coupled, double-set, multiple unit), train
"megálló" (meg-ah-low) = stop as in "tram stop", originally a shorter form of "megállóhely" (meg-ah-low-h-ey) = stop
"hely" (h-ey) = place, location. locality, site
"állomás" (awl-o-mah-sh) = station
"végállomás" (weh-gh-awl-o-mah-sh) = terminus, abreviated on route designations, etc as "vá."
"pályaudvar" (pah-yah-oodw-ahr) = a bigger railway station
"dél" (dehl) = south -> "déli" = southern, as in "Déli Pályaudvar" = "Southern Station" or "Budapest South"
"kelet" (kel-eth) = east -> "keleti" = eastern
"észak" (ey-suck) = north -> "északi" = northern
"nyugat" (new-gath) = west -> "nyugati" = western
"jegy" (ye-dj) = ticket
"bérlet" (behr-let) = seasonal pass
"útlevél" (ewth-leh-vehl) = passport

Remark: proper names like of a certain bridge, mountain, street, hospital, hotel, etc begin with a capital letter, e.g. "Gellért-hegy" (Gellert Hill). Common nouns (common words like "street", "square", etc) however begin with a small letter as in "pályaudvar" (station).

I think this is enough to understand a map on your own, or understand what you should search for when hearing the name of a place.

A few polite words:
"Jó reggelt!" (yow rag-galt) = Good morning!
"Jó napot!" (yow nah-pot) = Good day!
"Jó estét!" (yow ash-tate) = Good evening!
"Elnézést!" (al-naze-ey-sh-t) = Excuse me!
"Kérem!" (kaye-ram) = Please!
"Köszönöm!" (cuzh-ahn-ahm) = Thank you!
"Viszontlátásra!" (we-sant-lah-tah-sh-ra) = Good-bye!
"Szabad ez a hely?" (sabba-dh ezza hey) = Is this seat free?

Oh yes, and two of the probably most important words (thank you, Malcolm Blunden, for pointing out these missing):
"igen" (ee-ghen) = yes
"nem" (neh-m) = no

[Information about the hungarian language]
[A few lessons in hungarian]
[Online hungarian-english dictionary]

A few notes for photographers

Daylight conditions

Budapest is in the same time zone as most Central European countries - like Germany or Austria - but since it's quite on the eastern verge of that zone, daylight conditions are a bit different. It gets bright earlier, but it also gets dark earlier! While you can still take nice photos in Germany around 9:00PM in the summertime, there's already dusk over here. Therefore it's wise to wake up early in the morning and leave late evening for non-photographing activities :-)

Special places

To be granted an entry into a depot, you must ask BKV for a written permission. Regulations are quite strict, so the personnel is not allowed to let you in without a written permit even if you ask nicely, and even if you only want to take a few photos. They also don't like photographers in metro stations. Also, make sure not to impede traffic, not to cause inconvienence to passengers and personnel, not to use flash light, and keep out of spaces, where trespass is prohibited. I know this may seem very strict, so I feel I must mention the other extremities, too: there are many drivers who are transportation enthusiasts and photographers themselves, too :-)

Next page: Introduction to the rolling stock

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