Travelling to Brno

Recommended reading for your journey to Brno: Simon Mawer's The Glass Room. See here for details and reasons for the recommendation. Minor confession from the recommender: he has been too busy organising a conference to actually read it himself :-)

Overview

Planning your journey will involve making decisions about where you will enter the Czech Republic and how will get from that point to us. You will need to follow links, search online timetables, perhaps even buy tickets online and assemble all the information. And print this page.

You can fly directly to Brno, or you can fly to neighbouring Vienna, Prague, or Bratislava and get to Brno by bus or train.
 
   1. Flying directly to Brno
         Brno airport
         From the airport to the city
   2. Vienna
         From Vienna to Brno by coach
         From Vienna to Brno by train
   3. Prague
         From Prague to Brno by coach
         From Prague to Brno by train
   4. Bratislava
         From Bratislava to Brno by coach
         From Bratislava to Brno by train
   5. In Brno
         Now you are in Brno
         Bored in Brno

Flying directly to Brno

Brno airport

Turany is the name of the airport.
RyanAir operates direct budget  flights between Brno and Stansted (London), but on Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays only in both directions. Departing from the UK around at 13.30, from Brno around 17.00.
Czech Airlines operate (four times a day) flights Praha-Brno
Direct from Moscow

From the airport to the city

From Brno airport, Bus 76 takes you directly to the main railway station. The airport is the first stop and the railway station is the last stop, so just stand and relax - it can be pretty crowded. A ticket costs 30 crowns, and can be bought from  the bus driver or from a a multi-lingual yellow machine in Czech crowns (Kc) only. For the next and final leg of your journey, see the section below Now you are in Brno.

There are plenty of taxis of course. Approximate price: 350 Kc.

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Vienna

Schwechat is the name of the airport.

From Vienna to Brno by coach

The coach company, Student Agency  operates four direct bus connections from Vienna to Brno. The jouurney takes about 2.5 hours.

They pick up at the airport at these times:
Vienna airport to Brno – 8:05 a.m., 11:05 a.m., 6:05 p.m., 8:30 p.m.
Brno to Vienna airport – 3:05 a.m., 6:00 a.m., 1:15 p.m., 15:15 p.m.

Ticket price is 200 CZK (€ 8) and can be booked online.

From Vienna to Brno by train

There are airport busses leaving from directly in front of the airport to Meidling, the railway station that serves Brno. 

Czech Railways operate c.100 minute IC and EC connections between Vienna-Brno (continuing on to to Prague/Berlin/Hamburg). For interactive timetables, click here.  There are English and German flags on this site to change languages. Trains usually leave at the same time from the same platform every day. Tickets can be bought online.

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Prague

Prague airport 

Ruzyne is the name of the airport.
Once you've landed, there are several options for getting to Brno.
Train - see below
Fly - see the Brno Airport section above
Coach - see below

From Prague to Brno by coach

The coach company, Student Agency, operates direct bus connections from Prague city and the airport. There are more than ten connections in both directions each day. The bus journey to Brno by bus from Prague airport takes 3.5 hours. Tickets cost about 200 Kc (8 EUR). Online booking and timetables here

From Prague to Brno by train

Timetables

A far more scenic route than the motorway is the train, as it meanders at high speed through fields by creeks and castles and cattle. Take the Intercity or Supercity and enjoy a drink or meal, or both, in the buffet car. The journey time is not much longer than the bus if you choose your train wisely. Tickets can be bought online.

To get from the airport to Prague's main station (hlavni nadrazi), take the direct airport to main station bus. It's that simple!

Note: an R train (Rychlik = fast) is slower than IC and SC and does not have a buffet car.

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Bratislava

Bratislava airport - international airport in Slovakia. This is a smaller airport and it is used by some low-cost airlines. There is a bus line (no. 61) from the airport to the central train station that serves Brno (from the airport to the bus station you should use bus lines 61 or 96).   

From Bratislava to Brno by coach

Student Agency operates bus connection from Bratislava bus station to Brno.

There are these bus connections each day:
Bratislava bus station to Brno – 4:30 a.m., 12:15 p.m., 19:15 p.m.
Brno to Bratislava bus station – 8:50 a.m., 6:30 p.m., 7:30 p.m.).
Transport by bus takes 2 hours. Tickets: 250 CZK (€ 10).

From Bratislava to Brno by train

Frequent daily trains to Brno from Budapest via Bratlislava. Check the timetable here.

BY RAIL

Brno is one of the most important Central European rail junctions, as it is situated on the international Balkan-Budapest-Prague-Berlin-Scandinavia rail route. Euro City trains on the Vienna-Prague route have been stopping at Brno since 1991, and the City of Brno is taking an active part in the VRT, a project for the creation of a European network of highspeed rail routes.

Czech Railways
Bus and train timetables.
Domestic tickets can be bought online.

BY ROAD

Brno is situated at the intersection of the D1 (Prague - Brno) and D2 (Brno - Bratislava) motorways. Both these motorways form part of the trans-European highways East-West (France - Ukraine: E50) and North-South (Scandinavia - the Balkans: E55, E65) and they are serviced by the following bus companies:

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In Brno

Now you are in Brno. No matter how you arrive, you will arrive at the hub of Brno which consists of:

  • Hlavni nadrazi - the railway station
  • Masarykove autobusove nadrazi -  the bus station, affectionately known as Naproti grandu (as it is opposite the Hotel Grand)
  • Tram and bus stops. And taxi ranks.

Please do not judge Brno by what you see in this part of town - it is under long-overdue reconstruction.
Brno public transport company - DPMB
Brno timetables : tram, bus, trolley bus

Updated information: The information in grey is now invalid, as Brno is in the throes of summer work on public transport. The bold information replaces it.

To get to the Hotel Continental where most TALCers are staying, you can take Tram 4 in the direction of Náměstí Míru to the stop Take tram 3 or 5 to Ceska (Rasinova), a 5 minute journey.  Buy a ticket in Czech crowns (Kc) only from a multi-lingual yellow ticket machine.  Alternatively, you could take a 20 minute leisurely stroll following the Tram line - this takes you through Brno's gorgeous main square. 

The walk from there to the Continental takes another five minutes.  Keep walking in the direction the tram was going. Clamber through the building site between the court on your left and church on your right. Walk straight ahead, crossing the street with the park on your right (still no turning). You are now in Kounicova, the street - keep walking till you get to the Hotel. 

You could even take a taxi. The drivers will understand Hotel Continental but you won't get to share much other mutual information or frequency statistics as few drivers are as multi-lingual as the ticket machines! If you need a receipt, you can mime the usual and/or say "document, please" by using the phrase doklad, prosim [dock-lud pro-seem]. Tipping a taxi driver, if you haven't been charged more than c. 150 Kc, you might offer another 10 Kc.

Bored in Brno

Nuda v Brně (Bored in Brno) is the name of an award winning film 2003.  Anyway, if you arrive the evening before the conference starts, there are dozens of admirable restaurants in the vicinity of the hotel. If you need a steak at 2.00 am, there is a restaurant almost next door to the Hotel, Modra ruze. The staff speak English.

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(c) James Thomas and Jiri Salamoun

Quick Contact

James Thomas
Conference organiser
+420 549 49 7614
talc2010@gmail.com

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