Zentraler Omnibusbahnhof München (ZOB München, Central bus station Munich) is a central

bus station A bus station, bus depot, or bus interchange is a structure where city buses or intercity buses stop to pick up and drop off passengers. A bus station is larger than a bus stop, which is usually simply a place on the roadside, where buses can st ...

located in

Maxvorstadt Maxvorstadt (Central Bavarian: ''Maxvorstod'') is a central borough of Munich, Bavaria, Germany and forms the Stadtbezirk (borough) 3 Maxvorstadt. Since 1992, this borough comprises the former boroughs 5, 6 and 7 (Maxvorstadt-Universität, Maxvor ...

Munich Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...

Bavaria Bavaria, officially the Free State of Bavaria, is a States of Germany, state in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the list of German states by area, largest German state by land area, comprising approximately 1/5 of the total l ...

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

. The terminal has an area of . The bus station was established on 11 September 2009 and is a major transportation hub for bus and train with national and international traffic. The bus station also has spacious offices and retail space for retailers that give it an airport-like character. The nearest S-Bahn station is

Munich Hackerbrücke station Munich Hackerbrücke station is a station opened in 1972 on the Munich S-Bahn network below Hackerbrücke (Hacker bridge) that is close to Munich Central Station (). It is classified by Deutsche Bahn as a German railway station categories, categ ...

Location and description

The central bus station was opened on 11 September 2009 and is located in the immediate vicinity of the Hackerbrücke S-Bahn station and not far from

Munich Central Station Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...

. The

Hackerbrücke The Hackerbrücke (Hacker Bridge) is a road bridge across the main railway line in Munich immediately west of the town's central station. The first bridge was built at the beginning of the 1870s. In 1890-94 this was replaced by a new bridge, const ...

, which is located directly next door, is connected to the bus station building via two bridge bridges. Arnulfpark, a modern city quarter with residential and office buildings, cultural facilities and restaurants, is located in the immediate vicinity. The ZOB was designed as a multifunctional

property Property is a system of rights that gives people legal control of valuable things, and also refers to the valuable things themselves. Depending on the nature of the property, an owner of property may have the right to consume, alter, share, re ...

with a

floor area In architecture, construction, and real estate, floor area, floor space, or floorspace is the area (measured in square metres or square feet) taken up by a building or part of it. The ways of defining "floor area" depend on what factors of the bui ...

of around 25,000 m², seven

storeys A storey (Commonwealth English) or story (American English), is any level part of a building with a floor that could be used by people (for living, work, storage, recreation, etc.). Plurals for the word are ''storeys'' (UK, CAN) and ''storie ...

and various levels of use. The bus station, which is located below the ground floor, is accessible via ''Arnulfstraße'' and has 29 stops where national and international long-distance scheduled bus services as well as most of Munich's tourist bus services are operated.

Escalators An escalator is a moving staircase which carries people between floors of a building or structure. It consists of a motor-driven chain of individually linked steps on a track which cycle on a pair of tracks which keep the step tread horizon ...

elevators An elevator (American English) or lift (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English) is a machine that vertically transports people or freight between levels. They are typically powered by electric motors that drive tracti ...

take passengers to the first floor, where the shopping arcade with retail and catering areas is located, giving the ZOB an airport-like character.

Tenants A leasehold estate is an ownership of a temporary right to hold land or property in which a lessee or a tenant has rights of real property by some form of title from a lessor or landlord. Although a tenant does hold rights to real property, a lea ...

of the upper floor include

Lidl Lidl ( ) is a trademark, used by two Germany, German international discount supermarket, discount retailer chain store, chains that operates over 12,600 stores. The ''LD Stiftung'' operates the stores in Germany and the ''Lidl Stiftung & Co. K ...

dm-drogerie markt dm-drogerie markt (usually abbreviated as dm) is a chain of retail stores headquartered in Karlsruhe, Germany, offering cosmetics, healthcare items, household products and health food and drinks. The company was founded in 1973, when it opened ...

McDonald's McDonald's Corporation, doing business as McDonald's, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational fast food chain store, chain. As of 2024, it is the second largest by number of locations in the world, behind only the Chinese ch ...

, TUI and

Vapiano Vapiano SE is a European restaurant franchise company headquartered in Cologne. The chain's restaurants offer Italian food adhering to the fast-casual principle. Vapiano was established in 2002 in Hamburg.

. On three further upper floors and an area of about 10,300 m² there are offices, a

parking deck A multistorey car park (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English) or parking garage (American English), also called a multistorey, parking building, parking structure, parkade (Canadian English, Canadian), parking ramp, ...

and a

discotheque A nightclub or dance club is a club that is open at night, usually for drinking, dancing and other entertainment. Nightclubs often have a bar and discotheque (usually simply known as disco) with a dance floor, laser lighting displays, and ...

in the

basement A basement is any Storey, floor of a building that is not above the grade plane. Especially in residential buildings, it often is used as a utility space for a building, where such items as the Furnace (house heating), furnace, water heating, ...

Architecture

After a

public tender Government procurement or public procurement is the purchase of goods, works (construction) or services by the state, such as by a government agency or a state-owned enterprise. In 2019, public procurement accounted for approximately 12% of GDP ...

by the city of

in 2002, the contract for the design was awarded to the

architectural firm In the United States, an architectural firm or architecture firm is a business that employs one or more licensed architects and practices the profession of architecture; while in South Africa, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Denmark and other countr ...

Auer+Weber+Assoziierte Auer+Weber+Assoziierte is a German architecture firm, founded and headquartered in Stuttgart and Munich, Germany in 1980. The founders are Fritz Auer (born 24 June 1933), and Carlo Weber (6 April 1934-15 May 2014). History The architect's offic ...

''. The futuristic exterior façade is based on the shape of an ICE powerhead, which was to fit in with the redesign of Munich's main railway station discussed at the time. Almost 31 km of tubes were used for the aluminium tube design, which is unique in Germany.

Operation of the bus station

Owner

In 2014, the ZOB was acquired by the Munich issuing house WealthCap, previously owned by the project developer

Hochtief Hochtief AG is a global provider of infrastructure technology and construction services, with locations in North America, Australia, and Europe. The Essen based company is primarily active in the fields of high tech, energy transition, and sustai ...

. The bus station is operated by the

Bavarian Red Cross The German Red Cross (GRC) ( ; DRK) is the national Red Cross Society in Germany. During the Nazi era, the German Red Cross was under the control of the Nazi Party and played a role in supporting the regime's policies, including the exclusion o ...

User

The bus station is mainly used by numerous long-distance bus operators, but also by tour operators. For example, buses operated by companies such as

Flixbus FlixBus (; styled FLiXBUS) is a German brand that offers low-cost Intercity bus service, intercity coach services in Europe, North America, South America and Asia. It is owned by , which also operates FlixTrain, FlixCar, , and Greyhound Lines. F ...

IC Bus IC Bus (originally IC Corporation) is an American Bus manufacturing, bus manufacturer. Headquartered in Lisle, Illinois, IC is a wholly owned subsidiary of International Motors. Established in 2002 by Navistar through the reorganization of sub ...

, which offer national and international connections, regularly stop at the ZOB. Public buses are excluded, as the public transport connection is via

Munich S-Bahn The Munich S-Bahn () is an Railway electrification system, electric rail transit system in Munich, Germany. "S-Bahn" is the German abbreviation for ''Stadtschnellbahn'' (literally, "urban rapid rail"), and the Munich S-Bahn exhibits characteris ...

and

Munich tramway The Munich tramway () is the tramway network for the city of Munich in Germany. Today it is operated by the municipally owned Münchner Verkehrsgesellschaft (the Munich Transport Company, or MVG) and is known officially and colloquially as the ...

Fees

Buses stopping at the ZOB pay 6.00 euros for half an hour and 11.00 euros for a full hour's stay at the opening.Münchner Merkur
"Leere Schalter am neuen Busbahnhof"
31 August 2009, retrieved 2 May 2013. In 2018 the prices were 8.00 and 11.00 euros respectively. In addition, there are other price scales of up to 56.00 euros for the maximum permitted parking duration of 24 hours.

Criticism

The

premises Premises are land and buildings together considered as a property. This usage arose from property owners finding the word in their title deeds, where it originally correctly meant "the aforementioned; what this document is about", from Latin '' ...

located above the bus stops were criticised for several years due to their initial lack of attractiveness for

tenants A leasehold estate is an ownership of a temporary right to hold land or property in which a lessee or a tenant has rights of real property by some form of title from a lessor or landlord. Although a tenant does hold rights to real property, a lea ...

. For the opening of the bus station, only six of the 17 rental spaces could be let. Due to the low customer frequency of only 1,500 persons per day compared to the planned 8,000 to 10,000, several tenants cut their payments to the project developer

in 2011, whereupon

filed a

lawsuit A lawsuit is a proceeding by one or more parties (the plaintiff or claimant) against one or more parties (the defendant) in a civil court of law. The archaic term "suit in law" is found in only a small number of laws still in effect today ...

. The Landgericht München I ruled in favour of a tenant in a first case in 2013.Süddeutsche
"Fahrt ins Leere"
24 January 2013, retrieved 2 May 2013. The

deregulation Deregulation is the process of removing or reducing state regulations, typically in the economic sphere. It is the repeal of governmental regulation of the economy. It became common in advanced industrial economies in the 1970s and 1980s, as a ...

of the long-distance bus market in Germany led to a significant improvement in the use of the ZOB from the beginning of 2013.Abendzeitung
"Sparfüchse fahren jetzt Bus"
19 April 2013, retrieved 2 May 2013. Average arrivals and departures increased from 80 buses per day in 2010Münchner Merku

8 September 2010, retrieved 2 May 2013. to 135 per day in 2013. 42,000 buses per year, i.e. an average of 115 buses per day, were expected at the opening of the bus station.

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Zentraler Omnibusbahnhof Munchen Buildings and structures in Munich Bus stations in Germany Maxvorstadt Transport in Munich