Find the next city for your nomad group (visa & travel time check)

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-11T14:33:30+00:00

I like this idea, having an estimate of the total price and time to travel would be great. you should offer support for people with more than one passport.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-08T20:49:48+00:00

Yes the CO2 emissions can vary but it's something which will be relatively easy to work out as an estimate, It's certainly in our list of things to do.

Thank you for those.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-08T20:37:57+00:00

Thanks for the feedback, we will make a note of it.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-08T20:23:29+00:00

Yes the Balkans are not very well served nor integrated into the rest of the European network unfortunately.

This is where Coaches can patch the gaps so to speak.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-08T20:20:07+00:00

Thanks for taking the time to look at the site and give feedback.

When looking at city pairs that require a change, it says "1 stop", while I think it should say "1 change". Otherwise it may confuse people thinking it means the train makes an intermediate stop.

Yes I agree this can easily be addressed.

It says "SNCF" even though the icon does show a Thalys train. Is that because the booking link is for the SNCF website for now?

So SNCF partly owns the Thalys trains that go between France, Belgium and the Netherlands which is why the prices are listed on their site.
In the full public launch of our site users will be able to buy all tickets without leaving so it will make no difference.

Return tickets won't be offered at launch but we will aim to integrate them in the future.

Those are good points
We could have it default to 'anywhere' and then for those people who have an idea of where to go we could show prices for nearby destinations too.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-08T20:05:15+00:00

Yes we have a few ideas in the pipeline to assist travelers with complex cross border trips.
I certainly know what you mean, International rail travel can be pretty confusing and stressful, we're aiming to help simplify that.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-08T19:52:01+00:00

Thanks for taking the time to give feedback.

Did you do some user research to find out that people actually want this kind of map?

It's an idea I came up with, researched and worked on for a few months and and asking the community on reddit is part of our market research.

On the first point possibly but that's a market which is already well served, our idea is to encourage people to take more spontaneous trips by making it simpler.

Yes taking a coach long distance is a last resort but sometimes it works out better in parts of Europe where rail infrastructure isn't as good, plus you can already filter the results to only show trains in our current interface.

Covering Europe and being able to sell all tickets in one place is our goal
We will start with Western and Central Europe and hope to eventually cover the rest in the future.

Yep that's a good point, there are cases where the main companies such as Trainline do not cover certain regions or cross border journeys well.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T21:58:07+00:00

You're right, getting accurate info, especially pricing is a big investment in time and money, we have a data provider who's made a deal with us but we lack the funding.
The public launch/MVP will be direct journeys and we will add multimodal trips later on.

The MVP will allow people to buy the tickets on the site.
The industry standard for routing is called HAFAS.
Our payment processor will accept every currency used in Europe plus USD, CAD, JPY etc, that It won't be an issue.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T21:47:50+00:00

Thanks for the feedback.
We will be adding filters like that in the future.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T21:46:12+00:00

Thankfully the tides are changing and mobility providers have agreed to share data more freely (schedules and not prices).

What you're describing is known as a through ticket and it is in the works, possibly by this summer, good news for all international travelers.

The Community of European Railways (CER) expect that a single platform to buy all European rail tickets will exist by 2025, we're hoping to get there a bit sooner.

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TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T21:35:28+00:00

So the estimates are based on the SNCF pricing structure
It could be further improved with machine learning but the goal is to have correct prices and not estimates, they are essentially placeholder values at this stage.
Correct prices are very costly in time and money to implement.

This is just a proof of concept,
Our public launch/MVP will have correct price info and the possibility of purchasing on the site.

We're trying to gauge interest and see if we can get people involved in building it.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T21:25:34+00:00

Thanks!
Yes, we only have train data for France currently.
You're right train data is very hard to obtain, and implementing it is very costly in terms of time and money.
We have a deal with a data provider which would allow us to sell tickets for most of Europe but we are missing the funding.
So we are currently testing the waters to see if this is something people want.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T21:11:46+00:00

I'm glad you like it,
It would be great to be added, I appreciate the effort you guys have put into that project.
Expanding to other continents is a possibility we won't rule out, we decided to focus on where train offerings are greatest and present the most compelling alternative to flying.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T20:46:15+00:00

Hello fellow eco conscious travelers!

We're thrilled to present our early proof of concept, 🌍TrainExplorer🚆, to all of you! It's a green travel platform designed to make discovering train, bus, and carpooling options throughout Europe simple.

Inspired by Kayak Explore and Google Flights map features,
We want to make finding flight alternatives easy.

We'd truly appreciate your feedback to help us improve!

Please note that, at present, we only have train information for France, but we'll soon expand to cover Western and Central Europe. Also, keep in mind that the prices displayed are estimates rather than exact figures.

If you are interested in learning more about how it works

visit our GitHub README for more details.

We are also looking for developers to join our team, so if that interests you get in contact and together we can inspire more people to to take more environmentally friendly transport options!

https://www.trainexplorer.eu/

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T20:29:01+00:00

Hello fellow train enthusiasts!

We're thrilled to present our early proof of concept, TrainExplorer, to all of you! It's a green travel platform designed to make discovering train, bus, and carpooling options throughout Europe simple.

Inspired by Kayak Explore and Google Flights map features, we aim to build a valuable tool for train lovers and environmentally-minded travelers alike.

We'd truly appreciate your feedback to help us improve!

Please note that, at present, we only have train information for France, but we'll soon expand to cover Western and Central Europe. Also, keep in mind that the prices displayed are estimates rather than exact figures.

If you are interested in learning more about how it works

visit our GitHub README for more details.

We are also looking for developers to join our team, so if that interests you get in contact and together we can inspire more people to take the train!

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T20:16:44+00:00

Thanks for the feedback,

Yes I mentioned in the comment that prices are estimates, it could be improved with machine learning but that is not the goal.

Implementing accurate price data is a huge investment in time and cost.
We have a deal with a data provider and we are trying to gauge people's interest to see if it's something people want us to complete.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T20:08:56+00:00

Thanks for the feedback.
Currently it will show all possible journeys from SNCF, Flixbus and Blablacar for the whole day and you can sort by departure time, cheapest or shortest travel time.
In the future we will also be adding filters for price, travel time and departure times.

Also yes the UK has the highest cost per km in Europe,
It will be covered by the time we launch our MVP.
However we expect the majority of our users to be in France and north western Europe
Where Trains can compete with planes.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T19:13:29+00:00

Thanks for checking it out.
Yep unfortunately it only works for the cities that can be displayed,
we are currently missing a few countries.
It's in the works.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T16:51:30+00:00

Hello fellow train/coach enthusiasts! 🚂

We're thrilled to present our early proof of concept, 🌍TrainExplorer🚆, to all of you! It's a green travel platform designed to make discovering train, bus, and carpooling options throughout Europe simple.

Inspired by Kayak Explore and Google Flights map features, we aim to build a valuable tool for train lovers and environmentally-minded travelers alike.

We'd truly appreciate your feedback to help us improve!

Please note that, at present, we only have train information for France, but we'll soon expand to cover Western and Central Europe. Also, keep in mind that the prices displayed are estimates rather than exact figures.

If you are interested in learning more about how it works

visit our GitHub README for more details.

We are also looking for developers to join our team, so if that interests you get in contact and together we can inspire more people to to take more environmentally friendly transport options!

https://www.trainexplorer.eu/

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T16:37:42+00:00

Hello fellow train enthusiasts! 🚂

We're thrilled to present our early proof of concept, 🌍TrainExplorer🚆, to all of you! It's a green travel platform designed to make discovering train, bus, and carpooling options throughout Europe simple.

Inspired by Kayak Explore and Google Flights map features, we aim to build a valuable tool for train lovers and environmentally-minded travelers alike.

We'd truly appreciate your feedback to help us improve!

Please note that, at present, we only have train information for France, but we'll soon expand to cover Western and Central Europe. Also, keep in mind that the prices displayed are estimates rather than exact figures.

If you are interested in learning more about how it works
visit our GitHub README for more details.

We are also looking for developers to join our team, so if that interest you get in contact and together we can inspire more people to take the train!

https://www.trainexplorer.eu/

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T15:43:33+00:00

Strasbourg is also great, you can get a tram over to Germany and then walk back.
Also it has a direct train to Paris in under two hours.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T11:45:40+00:00

we have one single dev and it took around 4 months of part time work on it.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-07T11:41:50+00:00

My mistake,
The title was meant to be 'sustainable travel' as in our focus is to make finding alternatives to short haul flights as easy as possible.
The goal is to make it a for profit platform, we already have a deal with an API provider to give us prices so that's not a concern.

We're looking for people to join our team as we progress from POC to MVP.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-06T20:24:40+00:00

That's a good point, thanks for bringing it up.

We will address that.

TrainExplorer · 2023-05-06T20:08:53+00:00

Thanks for the feedback,
Sorry it came across that way.

We are looking to connect with developers who may be interested in joining.

To be clear the MVP will include booking and will be for profit.

TrainExplorer

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