Getting Around Bucharest

Bucharest, with it’s wide tree-lined avenues, many parks and fountains, and overcrowded public transport would have been an ideal place to cover on foot, but it’s not quite so compact for that. If you want to see the city in all its shades – the pleasant and the tacky, the grand and the grandiose - you’ll have to traverse the north and the south, the central and the suburban. In the north is old-money grandeur, in the south, Nicolae Ceausescu’s ambitious Civic Centre. Once you’re in the vicinity, you can make your way around on foot. To get from north to south, you can take the metro, which works from 5 am to 11:15 pm. Besides the metro, Bucharest also has a comprehensive network of trams, trolleys and buses. This is open from 4:30 am to 11 pm. Bucharest’s public transport system, since it’s inexpensive and convenient, is very popular with locals and tends to be crowded. Avoid using it between 8 and 10 am in the morning and 4 and 6 pm in the evening, which are peak hours.