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Comment by RamblingCTO | Hacker News Reader

He's not the only one though. I read about a guy that spends his whole days in trains, driving the whole day through Germany. They accounted for that, I'm sure. It just these people are in, what, the 0.000001% or something?

He's subsidized by the state and other passengers, not the company.

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>It just these people are in, what, the 0.000001% or something?

Exactly. It's not comfortable, it's not safe and cozy, it's not that cheap that homeless people would buy the BahnCard 100 that you couldn't find some form of cohabitation for a similar price.

And then there's the constant strikes as of now, so you might go days without shelter or need to pay for hotels which adds up quickly.

I'd say this is a rounding error

> it's not safe and cozy

What's unsafe about it?

Ending up at "random" train stations at weird times with all your experience belongings

He sounds like a confident young man; not one who quivers at the thought of travelling.

Being a confident young man can be pretty disastrous if you end up in wrong place wrong time. "The world is my oyster" levels of confidence can get you in trouble really fast. Not that it is the most likely scenario in Germany, but it is not a place where you can completely drop your guards everywhere all the time. Though I guess he is aware of the risks and acts accordingly.

Given that he mostly seems to travel by high speed train (ICE) every station he could possible end up unintentionally would be a relatively major one

Unless there was severe disruption, of course - since the lines have been so well standardised in Germany, ICE trains can travel on local lines too, so you could theoretically end up in the middle of nowhere if the train service was redirected mid-journey.

That's not guaranteed in Germany. Even places like Marburg have (had?) ICE connections passing through.

He sleeps in public train coaches (sometimes under the seats, if you look at his blog). This means he spends at least 6 hours a day unconscious - and vulnerable - in a public place that anyone can enter. Arguably less safe than sleeping at home behind a locked door.

Very arguably. Presuming the train has cameras, staff and other people on it, it could be argued it's safer than sleeping in a house.

it could be argued but then again you could argue that I'm actually the King of England. there is no question a private space would be better, and cameras or bystanders won't do jack for you until after the attack has started.

Or staff. Even if they are super efficient they 1) will never be there when the attack starts 2) will most probably not risk their own safety if the attack is violent 3) will call the police at the next station, since it doesn't make sense stopping the train in the middle of nothing. The best way of being safe is to avoid attacks in the first place. Being in a locked, enclose space (where you and you only control the lock) is much safer than being in a public space that anybody can occupy.

Armed train robberies are not all that common in Germany though.

In his position, train robberies aren't the first problem that comes to mind. Just somebody stealing my backpack with all my earthly possessions.

Statistically still quite unlikely I guess, and in any case, he would know better than any of us because he's the one who slept exclusively on trains for 1.5 years ;)

How is it unlikely, i know plenty of people personally that had something stolen in the high speed train in Germany while they weren't looking. And he's sleeping in the train every day.

Well, sounds like the people you know are not the brightest. Usually they make announcements on the stations where thefts occur to watch your belongings. (Usually where the train stays for 10-20 Minutes). I also don't know anyone who has gotten something stolen on the train personally.

Don't be a dick. It's easy to lose stuff to theft. It's got nothing to do with being bright.

It's even easier to forget stuff on the train and blame it onto theft

Again, nothing to do with brightness of a person

Pretty easy to reduce the chances of that with a lightweight cable lock. Just lock it around a seat post or armrest. A combination lock on the main compartment of his backpack would stop casual pilfering too.

Theft is though

DB Fernverkehr which sells the tickets and operates the long distance trains is not directly subsidized by the public (even if ultimately the public owns the company), by EU and German law. There may be some subsidies coming in indirectly via the infrastructure, but that would be more so the case for buses.

Great addition, thanks! DB is so complex, I have no clue where subsidies are applied and where not. I just imagined they'd have some tax cuts or something

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