Getting Around Istanbul
Istanbul is a giant city divided by two rivers and often plagued by traffic, so it’s worth thinking ahead of time how you will get around when you plan your day. Over our 10 day stay we tried every mode of transport available and learned some valuable lessons.
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Public Transport
Overall, public transport is quite effective and convenient, as everything can be handled using the Istanbul card. The card itself is about $2 and sold in terminals at ferry and metro stations as well as tobacco stands and the like. Once you have the card you can add money to it at the terminal (in some machines, you can buy and load in one transaction). Note that some machines will take credit cards while others only accept cash.
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Ferries
To start with, you will probably take a ferry at some point — whether to cross the Bosphorus, travel along it, or reach one of the nearby islands. They are a very efficient and cheap ($1) mode of transport between the different shores. Regular ferries (i.e. not tours) run about every 15 minutes and Eminönü to Kadıköy(crossing the Bosphorus) is about 15 minutes of travel time.
Metro
Metro is also frequent and efficient but there are only a few lines in the giant city so the chances that it will make sense for any particular trip are slim. Also, some of the stations are so massive, getting out of them is it’s own trip — you may need to walk a sizeable city block before reaching an exit. So if you are impatient like me, keep that in mind.
Trams
Trams are frequent and more widespread in the center; but they affected by traffic and so fairly slow. For reference, Grand Bazaar to Galata Tower takes about 20 minutes. Like the metro, these tend to get very packed in popular destinations.
Buses
We only took a bus once, so this observation is more anecdotal, but bus service appears to be less reliable in Istanbul. The stop we were at didn’t have route maps or even a list of all the lines that went past the stop. Nor is google maps useful for the schedule (you may get more mileage out of some different app that we never got). Based on the number of locals that were waiting for the bus with us, though, it seems the practice is simply to show up and wait patiently until your bus comes.
Cars
As you probably know, the regular taxis in Istanbul are terrible, not to say dangerous. What we noticed is that outside of a few countries in Europe, and especially as you get into western Asia, taxis stop using meters and increasingly become a free for all.
We caught two regular taxis on the street in Istanbul for short trips and both went badly; one turned a 15 minute ride into an hour, another resulted in a long argument over payment at the end. Who needs that aggravation — just don't do it. If you do, be very clear about price upfront and verify that the destination they are navigating to on their phone is correct. Twice, our destination address existed in multiple places in the city and we started going to the wrong one.
While Uber operates in Istanbul, it is pretty similar to regular taxis — as in Italy, it is merely a contact service for local taxis, so there will still be disagreements and headache when it comes time to pay. And the driver might be on a sex call in the process!
On the other hand, we had only good experience with the Indrive app (twice). Although we still paid in cash, price was exactly as promised. Also, when you find an honest driver, you can get their number and use them later.
But be prepared — pretty much all taxis here, whatever service you use, are congenitally seatbeltless, and, if you make it to an open highway, the drivers imagine themselves to be in a Formula1 race.
On foot
You will likely mostly be traveling on foot. Self explanatory. One thing to keep in mind is that Google pedestrian directions are not great here. Many times it would suggest extensive walkarounds where a direct path was available, so don’t follow it blindly.
That’s it - good luck exploring this vibrant city!
