Cheap city centre hotel in Zurich hotel with good pub trans links?

June 18, 2013 1:36 AM

I will be heading to Zurich to see the end of the EV Wave event in early July and need a city centre hotel that is affordable to stay at. Good public transport links are a must as this is how I will be getting around. Suggestions?

Also, bonus points if you can offer any advice on things like:

* How to get from airport to the hotel
* How good the public transport is

posted by Nufkin to Travel & Transportation around Zurich, Switzerland (7 answers total)

Best answer: Can I suggest AirBNB instead of hotels? Those usually better value. Hotels in Zurich can be very expensive.

There's direct public transport from the Airport (Flughafen) to the main Station (Zürich HB, Hauptbahnhof) every 10min. From the main station it's a 5min walk to the beginnings of the old part of town.

Zurich overall is small. You can reach either end by PT in 20mins. PT is well organised and reaches everywhere. Stick to trams instead of buses for simpler handling (knowing where to get off etc.) Google Maps knows PT in Zurich.
posted by oxit at 2:37 AM on June 18, 2013

Best answer: this guesthouse was the best compromise on location and cost that I could find.

Bonus: it was adorably hipster, implecably clean, and the cafe downstairs had amazing food.

As mentioned above, Zurich is TINY, and I found public transit pretty rock solid.
posted by larthegreat at 4:10 AM on June 18, 2013

Best answer: Public transport in Zürich is fantastic: frequent, regular, reliable. You can take the buses as well as the trams with impunity, because they all have screens that show which stop you're at and which are coming up. Pro-tip: trams stop at every point, whereas buses have some request stops for which you have to press the button. You really ought to get the ZVV timetable app (here's the Android version; there is certainly one for iOS), which is very easy to use.

I've heard good things about this hostel, which is also a good café, though it might be a bit far from the centre for you. I think there are cheap-ish ho(s)tels around Langstrasse, though some of these (like the one my dad and stepmum stayed in when they visited, oops) are seedier than others.

The EV Wave event looks fantastic, by the way, and thanks for bringing it to my attention. You should totally make a meetup while you're here!
posted by daisyk at 9:56 AM on June 18, 2013

Best answer: Kafischnaps is another hostel/cafe quite close to the city center and a short walk to the swimming spots on the river. It's one of my favourite cafes in the city, and the rooms are quite comfortable.
posted by aiglet at 12:54 PM on June 18, 2013

Whoops, aiglet's link is the one I meant to put into "this hostel". Thanks, aiglet.
posted by daisyk at 9:04 AM on June 19, 2013

Response by poster: Thank you everyone. I will be going through all the options this weekend and booking. One minor follow up question, if I may and people are still checking this thread: How well will I get by only knowing English?
posted by Nufkin at 2:53 AM on June 21, 2013

Best answer: You'll cope well with only English. Despite its small size, Zurich is a very international city and people in retail, restaurants and PT will speak English decent enough to converse.
posted by oxit at 4:44 AM on June 22, 2013