Transportation in Neukölln

U-Bahn

Neukölln is served by two U-Bahn subway lines, the northwest-to-southeast U7 (Rathaus Spandau ↔ Rudow) via Jungfernheide and Wilmersdorfer Straße/Charlottenburg, and the north-to-south U8 (Wittenau ↔ Hermannstraße) via Alexanderplatz, with an interchange between the two at Hermannplatz.^{[note 2]} Within Neukölln, the U7 has three additional eastbound stations along the Karl-Marx-Straße: Rathaus Neukölln, Karl-Marx-Straße and Neukölln, the latter being an interchange between U- and S-Bahn. The U8 has three additional southbound stations along the Hermannstraße: Boddinstraße, Leinestraße and Hermannstraße, the latter being the quarter's second interchange between U- and S-Bahn.

Three U-Bahn stations just outside of the quarter offer quicker access to certain neighborhoods of Neukölln: Südstern (U7) to the western parts of Hasenheide, Schönleinstraße (U8) to the Reuterkiez, and Grenzallee (U7) to the southern and south-eastern industrial parks including the Neukölln Harbor.

During workday nights, approximately between 1:00 and 4:00, Berlin's subways are not operational, but are replaced by buses. In Neukölln, the U7 and U8 are replaced by the bus lines N7 and N8 respectively. During nights before Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays, the U-Bahn lines operate continuously.

S-Bahn

Neukölln is served by four S-Bahn commuter lines, with U-Bahn interchanges at Berlin-Hermannstraße (U8) and Berlin-Neukölln (U7), each for all of the four lines. The shorter S47 connects the quarter to Südkreuz in the west, and via Baumschulenweg station, Niederschöneweide and the Schöneweide–Spindlersfeld branch line to Spindlersfeld in the south-eastern Dahme suburbs. The long-haul S46 connects Neukölln to Westend in the far west via Südkreuz, Westkreuz and Messe Nord/ZOB close to the Messe Berlin exhibition grounds, the ICC and Berlin's central bus station (ZOB). In the opposite direction, the S46 connects to the town Königs Wusterhausen south-east of Berlin via Baumschulenweg station, Adlershof, Grünau and the town Zeuthen. Two additional important services are the Ringbahn circle lines S41 (clockwise) and S42 (counter-clockwise), providing access to numerous U-Bahn and S-Bahn interchanges, and connecting through all of Berlin's crosses, Südkreuz, Westkreuz, Gesundbrunnen (Nordkreuz) and Ostkreuz with many intercity travel options.^{[note 3]} Overall, Neukölln has four S-Bahn stations, the aforementioned Hermannstraße and Neukölln as well as Sonnenallee on the Ringbahn at the outskirts of Rixdorf, and Köllnische Heide on the southeastbound railway, providing S-Bahn access to the inhabitants of Weiße Siedlung, High-Deck-Siedlung and Schulenburgpark.

Bus

Due to sufficient access to U- and S-Bahn for most areas of Neukölln, the quarter is currently not served by any of Berlin's ExpressBus lines. Still, Neukölln has several regular bus lines, connecting for example Marzahn (194) and Marienfelde (277). There are also four MetroBus lines, the most important ones being the M29 connecting via Checkpoint Charlie and the southern Potsdamer Platz area to the western city center including Kurfürstendamm, the M41 to Berlin Central Station via Potsdamer Platz, and the southbound M44 via Britzer Garten to Buckow-Süd, the terminus of a potential extension of the U-Bahn line U8 (see below). In addition to the N8 and N7 U-Bahn replacement bus lines during night hours (see above), Neukölln is served by several regular night bus lines, for example the N94, which connects Hermannplatz and Lichtenberg railway station via Ostkreuz.

Airport connections

Since the closing of the airports Tegel and Tempelhof, whose airfield was partially situated in Neukölln, Berlin only has one remaining international airport, Berlin Brandenburg Airport (BER), the former (and greatly extended) Berlin Schönefeld Airport just outside of Berlin.^{[note 4]} Since the 2025 timetable change, which included the cancellation of the S-Bahn line S45, the quarter Neukölln has no direct daytime connection to the BER anymore.

When exclusively using the U-Bahn, an interchange between subway and the airport express bus lines X7 and X71 is necessary at the current U7 terminus Rudow.^{[note 5]} If the S-Bahn is the primary mode of transport, BER passengers to and from Neukölln can use interchanges at Südkreuz station between S-Bahn and the FEX airport express train or the regional express train RE20, which both connect to the BER, and are usually the fastest routes between Neukölln and the airport.^{[note 6]} A slightly longer alternate route is possible with an interchange at Schöneweide station between the S-Bahn lines S46 or S47 and the regional express trains RE24 or RE32.^{[note 7]} When exclusively using the S-Bahn, BER passengers to and from Neukölln need to use interchanges at Baumschulenweg station between the S46 or S47 (to and from Hermannstraße, Neukölln and Köllnische Heide) and the southern lines S85 and S9.^{[note 8]} During the night, the service on the U-Bahn line U7 is replaced by the night bus line N7, which directly connects Neukölln and the airport.^{[note 9]}

Ferry

Neukölln does not offer any regular public ferry transport, but several landing stages for a variety of private charter tours exist in Neukölln. Berlin shipping company Stern und Kreisschiffahrt, which is based at the Treptow Harbor, operates a landing at the Estrel Hotel on the Neukölln Ship Canal, with one route through Neukölln along the Landwehr Canal. Former Kreuzberg shipping company Reederei Riedel, which is now based at the Rummelsburg Harbor in Oberschöneweide, operates two landings, the Kottbusser Brücke at the Landwehr Canal, and the Wildenbruchbrücke at the Neukölln Ship Canal. One of their ships is the 1962 Rixdorf, which has been in their service since 1987 and is authorized for 250 passengers and crew.^{[note 10]}

Motorized individual transport

Since Neukölln is densely populated and highly urbanized, most of its streets come with a speed limit of 30 km/h (19 mph) for motorized vehicles, including more aggressive urban planning measures in recent years aimed at reducing traffic with one-way roads and concepts like the Spielstraße ("play street"), modal filters or larger-scale neighborhood blocks (Kiezblock, LTN).^{[note 11]} Furthermore, in 2024 the Senate of Berlin and the borough's administration have begun to monetize public parking space in the northern neighborhoods to steer away some of the excess traffic.^[2]

Nevertheless, several main roads function as important arterial connections to other parts of Berlin: Columbiadamm, Urbanstraße and Hasenheide connect to the western parts of Berlin south of the city center via Tempelhof and the western neighborhood of Kreuzberg 61 respectively, while Sonnenallee, Karl-Marx-Straße and Hermannstraße connect to southern and south-eastern parts of Berlin via Britz and Baumschulenweg respectively. The Kottbusser Damm is the main road to the SO 36 neighborhood of Kreuzberg in the north, but traffic calming measures have reduced its importance in recent years. Except for the Columbiadamm, all of the above arterial roads converge at Hermannplatz. None of Neukölln's large arterial roads are part of Germany's Bundesstraßen network.

The A100 autobahn at Neukölln's border with Britz connects to the western parts of Berlin, and via its most recent extension through parts of eastern Neukölln to Alt-Treptow. The A100 offers three exits and on-ramps in the Britz and Neukölln quarters, Britzer Damm with Hermannstraße, Buschkrugallee with Karl-Marx-Straße, and Sonnenallee. A highly contended final extension^[3] is planned to extend the A100 further into Friedrichshain and Lichtenberg via Ostkreuz. At the interchange Autobahndreieck Neukölln, the A100 connects to the A113 autobahn, which leads south to BER airport and the A10, Berlin's orbital autobahn. At the interchange, the A113 also has a direct on-ramp from Grenzallee, and an indirect exit to Grenzallee via Bergiusstraße.

Neukölln is part of Berlin's tight inner-city network of taxi and ridehailing services. Furthermore, free-floating carsharing is relatively widespread in urban Berlin. Still, the quarter Neukölln alone has more than ten dedicated carsharing stations, several of them also for transport vans.

Bicycle traffic

Most of Neukölln's one-way streets are two-way for cyclists. In 2017, the western parts of Weserstraße opened as Neukölln's first bicycle boulevard, and in the following years, several side streets have been rededicated as such, at first especially in the trendier districts of Reuter- and Schillerkiez, but now slowly expanding into other neighborhoods.^{[note 12]} Larger main roads have been reconstructed to include properly separated bike lanes, for example Kottbusser Damm and Hasenheide, with plans for more reconstruction in the coming years. Neukölln's most ambitious project is the 20.2 km (12.55 mi) "Y route" (Y-Trasse), a forked dual bicycle highway (Radschnellverbindung) from south-eastern Berlin through Neukölln to Kreuzberg.^{[note 13]} Berlin and Neukölln have several bicycle-sharing systems with a large fleet of standard and electric bicycles, as well as cargo bikes and e-scooters.

Pedestrian traffic

Due to Berlin's usually broad sidewalks, extensive speed limits, especially on side streets, and other measures like play streets and an increasing number of one-way streets, Neukölln has become a rather safe environment for pedestrians. However, compared to other German cities, very few pedestrian zones exist in Neukölln, currently only the "youth street" Rütlistraße (Reuterkiez) and the Tempelhofer Feld. There are proposals and concrete plans to rededicate certain locations as either pedestrian zones or mixed zones for pedestrians and cyclists, for example the Elbestraße and Weichselstraße in the Reuterkiez.

Several hiking trails exist along the waterways within or bordering Neukölln, primarily the Landwehr Canal, parts of the Neukölln Ship Canal, the Britz Canal, and the Heidekampgraben in the east, which is part of Berlin's Mauerweg. Other green trails are limited to Neukölln's parks, especially the Hasenheide, the Tempelhofer Feld, the Carl-Weder-Park, and the eastern garden plots. However, due to Neukölln's highly urbanized and partially industrialized character, few of the trails are sufficiently interconnected, as it is often found in the suburban quarters of Berlin. Still, Trail 18 of Berlin's officially designated Grüne Hauptwege (main green trails) leads from the Tempelhofer Feld through Neukölln's western cemeteries and parks, Alt-Rixdorf and along the Neukölln Ship Canal via Trusepark into Kreuzberg and beyond.^[4]

U-Bahn

There are concrete medium-term plans to extend the U7 south beyond Rudow to directly connect the airport BER to Neukölln and the rest of Berlin via U-Bahn, adding a minimum of two and up to seven additional stations in between, with Schönefeld also functioning as an S-Bahn interchange.^[12] In 2024, two performance audits for the extension began, with the Berlin audit still under way,^[13] while the audit by the Schönefeld municipality ended with a positive result in April 2025.^[14] The planned extension will not open before 2035,^[15] and the U7 would then be the first of Berlin's U-Bahn lines to reach beyond the city's borders.

As Greater Berlin has been steadily growing since German reunification to now almost 4.8 million inhabitants, with extensive residential construction happening in Berlin's immediate surrounding regions, public transport extensions to the city's periphery are propagated frequently. With regard to Neukölln, an internal 2023 BVG feasibility study on long-term U-Bahn network expansion included a southbound extension of the U8 beyond Hermannstraße, terminating in the south of Buckow on the border to Brandenburg's Gartenstadt Großziethen,^[16] which would tilt southern Neukölln's modal share toward public transport, and away from private car use (see above).

S-Bahn

The second half of the 2040s will see the completion of the fourth and last phase of construction (BA 3B) for the planned S21, which currently operates only as a northern stump line, the shuttle S15 between Gesundbrunnen and Hauptbahnhof. The last phase will revive parts of the historical Südringspitzkehre railway connection between the western branch of Berlin's north–south lines and the Ringbahn through the Cherusker Park in the south of the Rote Insel. This "Cheruscan Bend" (Cheruskerkurve) will connect the stations Julius-Leber-Brücke and Südkreuz, providing a direct connection from Neukölln to Potsdamer Platz and Hauptbahnhof.^[17]

The borough administrations of Treptow-Köpenick and Neukölln have often pushed for an additional station on Berlin's Ringbahn, primarily at the Kiefholzstraße on the border of the two boroughs. However, the Berlin transport providers aim at one Ringbahn revolution every 60 minutes. Under this guideline, only one station can be added to the lines S41/42 for the whole of Berlin. The Kiefholzstraße therefore competes against four other proposed stations, one of them in Neukölln as well, namely Oderstraße at the south-eastern corner of the Tempelhofer Feld.^[18]

Bus and DRT

Two new MetroBus and ExpressBus lines are planned, the M94 to Friedrichsfelde-Ost via Treptow and Ostkreuz station, and the X77 from Hermannstraße to Marienfelde via Alt-Mariendorf.^[19]

Mainly two neighborhoods of Neukölln are insufficiently connected to the Berlin public transportation system, either because they were never developed (Schillerpromenade), or because the old and narrow streets prevent the establishment of bus lines (Alt-Rixdorf). Therefore, the Berlin Senate and the BVG plan to create a network of DRT bus lines (Rufbus) for large parts of Neukölln, from the western neighborhoods at the Tempelhofer Feld to the Sonnenallee in the east, covering Schillerpromenade, Flughafenstraße, Rollberg, Körnerpark and both Rixdorf neighborhoods.^[20]

Tram

Despite Rixdorf's and Neukölln's important role in the historical development of Berlin's tramway, the quarter currently has no connection to the city's modern MetroTram system. Due to the Teltow slopes and narrower streets in places like Flughafenstraße, only Neukölln's northern neighborhoods in the glacial valley are immediately suitable for tram expansion. A long-gestating plan proposes to extend Berlin's so-called "party tram"^[21] line M10 by the year 2031^[22] from Kreuzberg (SO 36) through the Görlitzer Park and crossing the Landwehr Canal into Neukölln, with stations in the Reuterkiez planned at Framstraße, Pannierstraße and U Hermannplatz on Urbanstraße via Sonnenallee.^[23] This would create a direct public transport connection from Neukölln (Reuterkiez) to Kreuzberg, Friedrichshain, Prenzlauer Berg, Mitte, Moabit via Berlin Central Station, and Jungfernheide station in Charlottenburg-Nord.^[24]

To replace Neukölln's overstrained "ghetto bus"^[25] line M41, the Berlin Senate also has concrete plans to create a new tram line from Schöneweide S-Bahn station (or further east from Oberspree station) through Johannisthal along the Königsheide, part of the former Cölln Heath, through Baumschulenweg, Neukölln and Kreuzberg 61 along Sonnenallee and Urbanstraße via Hallesches Tor to Potsdamer Platz.^[26]

Maglev

The Berlin Senate's forthcoming mobility program for the year 2035 is expected to contain plans for urban transit maglev trains, with one line to connect Berlin's ICC and exhibition grounds with the BER airport. One already proposed potential route would lead along the A100 autobahn and through the southern parts of the Neukölln quarter.^[27] The proposal has been rejected with harsh criticism by public transport experts, who stated that the chances of this technology being used as part of Berlin's public transport network were slim.^[28] They emphasized that maglev trains would merely strengthen something that is already covered by the city's traditional public transport infrastructure, without increasing efficiency, and that the technology would neither provide the necessary last-mile and suburban extensions nor give more residents access to the city's existing network.^[29]