 If there's a single transit innovation that has changed the world the most in the last century, it's probably the S-Bond and the city center tunnels that so often make such systems possible. And when talking about S-Bonds, no city comes to mind for me like Munich, which has 8 different S-Bond lines on top of a comprehensive U-Bond network. Together, these rail lines move nearly 2 million people per day pre-COVID over more than 200 stations and 500 kilometers of track. So let's dive in and see how this network achieves these very impressive numbers. Munich is a city region of over 3 million people and the largest city of the southern state of Bavaria in Germany. Like most major cities, it's got many key nodes, both from a transportation demand standpoint as well as a general city important standpoint. But none is quite as important as Munich Central Station or Munich-Helpenhof, which serves as a major intercity and regional transport hub as well as a local urban transport station. Munich East Station serves a similar, albeit significantly less important, role. Another major intercity transport hub lies to the northeast of the city center with Munich Airport. Like with many German cities and fairly unique among cities around the world, Munich has a massive messa, which is basically like an unbelievably big convention center where huge events and shows take place, stressing the rail system with thousands of visitors all at once. Now, speaking of large events in Germany, the very famous Bayern Munich has its famous Allianz Arena north of the city center, which also played host to a number of games in the 2006 World Cup and is one of my personal favorite arenas. And we can't forget the Olympic Park that was built for the 1972 Summer Olympics. Sitting across from that park is the BMW Museum, and the company actually has its headquarters and origins in the region. Of course, despite that, Munich still has an excellent public transport system, something which you can't necessarily say for North American motor towns. Managing to move people all over the city requires major connecting hubs, and none is quite as important as sending your tour, a major hub on the U-Bahn, as well as Odeon Splats, both of which are major urban rail hubs. Now that you've got the lay of the land, let's look at the specifics of the S-Bahn network, which is electrified at 15 kVac, as with the national network in Germany, and which operates over standard gauge tracks. The system has two different types of trains, the Class 420, first introduced in 1967, and the 423, first introduced in the late 90s, and now making up the majority of the trains used on the system. The Class 423s feature a modern, metro-esque design, lots of doors, as well as Jacob's bogies, which are shared between the carriages of the four-car units, which are often combined into longer 8 and 12 car trains. Interestingly, the Class 423s are also used in other German S-Bahn systems, such as in Frankfurt. If you were curious, the interior of the trains primarily consists of a lot of transverse seating, and on renovated units there are nice modern digital wayfinding screens. All trains have quite a bit of standing room for peak loads. What makes an S-Bahn and S-Bahn is usually the city center corridor, which in the case of Munich includes a roughly four-kilometer tunnel opened in 1972, connecting Munich Central and Munich East Stations, with Munich Central featuring dedicated underground S-Bahn platforms as well as four other underground stations. Interestingly, for maximum capacity on the two tracks in the tunnel, Central Station and Karlsplatz both implement the Spanish solution with platforms on both sides of the trains and an island in the middle, while Marionplatz implements the Spanish solution with tracks on two levels. This tunnel and central corridor, which is actually not even entirely underground, extends two stations to the west of the Hauptbahnhof. These additional stations are located where major roadways cross the giant rail corridor into Munich Central, almost all of the land in which is dedicated to intercity and regional trains as opposed to S-Bahn. The central corridor itself is used by all main S-Bahn services, with virtually all trains stopping at the eight central stations. During peak periods, there are 30 trains per hour operating through the core. That's about a train every two minutes. It should also be noted that all of the infrastructure on the S-Bahn is designed for larger, longer, and faster trains than are typically seen in urban metros, with speeds of up to 140 kilometers per hour in some sections. Outside of the center of the city, the vast majority of the trackage used by the S-Bahn system is on the surface, and lines extend far from the center to outlying villages and rural areas. These outer parts of the network frequently have single track sections and level crossings, but this is fine as the basic service level on single routes is typically around 3 trains per hour, or a train every 20 minutes, with some service levels on the furthest extents of the network reduced to 2 trains per hour. These single track sections are often next to double-tracked railways for longer distance regional, intercity, and even cargo trains, and sometimes the S-Bahn shares its tracks with other traffic in outlying areas. And of course, S-Bahn services are scheduled to optimize for transfers. Talking about specific routes, there are currently 8 services operated. S-1 branches in the north, with one branch going to the airport, and travels down to the core from the west, ending just beyond east station. Trains arriving at the branch point are often coupled together into a single set, and uncoupled headed in the reverse direction. S-2 is a little to the west of S-1, and also branches in the north, albeit with longer branches, before passing through the core and heading to the northeast. S-3 starts in the west, and travels east and southeast into and through the core to the east station, where trains actually reverse, like the Toei Urban Park Line in Tokyo, or some Zurich S-Bahn services, which do have a lot in common with the Munich S-Bahn, I mean these cities aren't that far apart. From east station, trains then exit westwards before turning to head south. S-4 is a mostly typical cross-city east-west line, however the service turns north of the eastern end to serve some towns. S-6 starts in the southwest along a major lake, before crossing the city and following along with the S-4 to its eastern terminus. As it turns out, the eastern part of S-4 is only operated during peak periods, while it operates as part of S-6 at all times. S-4 trains otherwise turn back early. S-7 essentially acts as an arc opening down, running from the southwest of the core, through the center, and then to the southeast, east of S-3's southern lake. S-8 starts in the southwest before passing through the core and heading north of the city, with a few tunneled sections that take it under villages before it merges with S-1 to serve the airport with a frequent service. The last route, S-20, does not operate all the time, and instead operates an infrequent service during weekdays from the south entirely on S-7 Trackage, and then to the west rather than through the core bypassing a number of stations. While the frequencies across the system may not seem super high, a large part of the network has higher frequencies where services overlap and combine to provide more, so services better than it might initially seem. Extra services are also filled in when capacity allows. On top of the impressive S-Bahn system, it's important to not forget that Munich also has an excellent U-Bahn network. Unlike the S-Bahn, which runs 24 hours on weekends, and the S-8, which runs 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, the U-Bahn closes late at night for work like most metros, though for less time than most, closing for just about 2 hours a night on weekends. The U-Bahn, like the S-Bahn, uses a standard train specification along all lines, with trains powered by a 750V DC bottom contact third rail operating on standard gauge tracks, and featuring a lot of transverse seating for a metro. Trains are fairly wide at 2.9 meters, and fairly long at around 120 meters with up to 6 cars, which means that the cars on the U-Bahn are actually slightly longer than the carriages used on the S-Bahn. There are 3 types of trains operating on this system, the A, B, and C, with the A trains being built from the 60s to the 80s, the B trains from the 80s to the 90s, and the C trains in the early 2000s up until present. There has been a newer revision in recent years, and I must say I am quite a fan of the look of the C type trains, they're just really modern and attractive. Now I should warn you that the Munich U-Bahn is weird, and quite unlike most other metro systems. To start, it effectively has three city-centered tunnels, each with two tracks which cross to form a triangle between where the lines intersect, rather than intersecting at a single station. However, all lines on the U-Bahn operate multiple services. One tunnel carries the U1 and U2 that branch out on either side onto their own alignments, another carries the U4 and U5 that split in the east but run together in the west with U4 turning back early, and a third tunnel carrying the U3 and U6 that again split on both the north and south of the city. The lines come together at the center with the central station connecting U1, U2, U4, and U5, Odian's Plats connecting U4, U5, U3, and U6, and Sendling Erzor connecting U1, U2, U3, and U6. U1 and U2 also intersect at different points with U3 outside of the core, and the same is true for U2 and U5. These connections are useful for moving the intercompatible trains as well as work equipment around the network for service, and such connections between lines is fairly common in many metro systems, but the connections here are actually also used in service for the limited U7 and U8 lines, which only operate during rush hour and Saturdays respectively. This allows the U7 to start on U1, going through the center, and then connecting onto U5 for a few stops. The U8 operates similarly but starts alongside U3 tracks before connecting onto U2 and joining the U7 at central station. Much like on the S-Bahn, many of the metro services do not operate all that frequently for a metro, but this as usual means that their interline sections do receive higher frequency, and this also enables the U7 and U8 services to slot in. The network also just isn't infrastructure heavy on the track side. Many stations have additional platforms such as wherever lines split apart and where tracks come together from one line to another, enabling lots of cross-platform transfers, some of which are actually timed in the schedule to have trains stopping at the same moment to enable connections. Interestingly, most of the network is below ground, but the U5 and U6 both are above ground adjacent to their depots, and the U6's above ground section continues north to its terminus, including through some essentially rural landscapes. I also have to mention that the U6 and U3 serve Allianz Arena and the Olympic Park respectively, which both have large stations with two island platforms and four tracks for extra capacity. Interestingly, in both cases there's a nearly one kilometer walk to the stations, which helps to spread people out so that trains don't become overwhelmed by a crushing wave of spectators. Now, sometimes North America gets the reputation of having a monopoly on crazy land use, but one very interesting example from Munich is the U2 line, which terminates with two stations at the Messe on its eastern end, which is pretty reasonable. But the station preceding these stations is a fully underground subway station right along a street consisting entirely of large single family homes with street parking, which is quite interesting. Now, Munich does have great transit today, and unlike some other cities in Europe, it's also actively working on a ton of major new projects. On the U-Bahn, U5 is being extended to a major S-Bahn and mainline rail station, and likely beyond, and the U6 is being extended to the south. There's also a plan for a new U9 line, which would reorganize the network, giving U3 and U6 dedicated tunnels through the center and making direct trips between central station and Allianz Arena and beyond possible, as the U9 tunnel will redirect either end of U6 through the Helpbahnhof. On the existing network, plans for platform screen doors are advancing, and this will help improve reliability on the network, which can be often compromised by its significant interlining. A new second S-Bahn tunnel is also under construction. It will be deeper than the existing one, and will bypass many central stations, from end to end, stopping at Central, Mariannplatz, and Ausbahnhof. A number of new S-Bahn services will be added using the new tunnel, and the S1 and S6 services will also be moved to it. There have also been discussions of a Ringbahn akin to in Berlin. It's still in its early days, but Munich already has the rail right of ways and connections to existing S-Bahn lines that could be the basis of such a line, so it could be built moderately easily, probably starting in the north where more of the infrastructure exists. Suffice to say, a lot is happening in Munich, and honestly, it's close to the top of my list for cities I need to visit next year, so I think we'll be talking more about the city soon. Thanks for watching, and I'll see you in the next one. A special thanks to Jacob, Julian, and Thomas for their on-the-ground footage from Munich for this video.