Artistic, high-tech, retro, gleaming metal and glass, recycling, futuristic, classical, and homey – you name it. Bus stops can be very exciting. There are so many funky and wonderful bus stops around the world.

If you like a bizarre theme, here’s one in Ventura, California, USA.

Photo source: Screenshot by author

One of the many ultra high-tech futuristic bus stops planned in Florence. Italy.

Photo source: Screenshot by author

If you like a nature theme, here’s a totally recyclable and environmentally friendly bus stop from central Finland.

Photo source:

The first bus stop in the world probably dates from around 1662 from France. They didn’t have bus stops on roadsides as we have now but rather stations for giving water and food to the horses, which drew the buses then.

This bus stop in Curitiba, Brazil is probably one of the most photographed bus stops in the world for its funky design.

Photo source:

Creature comforts at a bus stop? The air-conditioned Wild Wadi bus stop at Burj-al-Arab in Dubai gives you protection from the elements. Do you know if there are any heated bus stops in a cold country, where the temperatures are below freezing point most of the year? 

Photo source:

Sometimes someone has enough of vandalism and boring bus stops and decides to take matters in their own hands by adding a personal touch to a common bus stop.

Photo source:

Jane Tinsley, 47, in the UK, transformed the drab bus stop into a lovely retreat.

Photo source:

A funky 1950s style bus stop in Havana, Cuba proclaims the progressive and future oriented nature of the system with this architecture.

Photo source:

A modernistic bus stop in Aachen, Germany called Eisenman or the Ironman

Photo source:

What form of transport are you really waiting for? This bus stop in Stovring, Denmark makes you feel that you are waiting in a space pod.

Photo source:

A funky bus stop in Scottsdale, Arizona, USA, that blends in wonderfully with the surrounding architecture.

Photo source:

Waiting for the bus shouldn’t be boring! Try to exercise your memory and remember the name of this bus stop on the HongKong/Shenzen, China border:

Photo source:

The theme of going back to nature and austerity with green values taken to the extreme in an abandoned bus stop in Shakujou, Japan. Notice the umbrella someone who had waited too long and left on the back wall.

Photo source:

Strawberry bus stop in Japan for the fruity people.

Photo source:

If you’re alone, might just as well relax in this Vancouver, Canada design of a bus stop.

Photo source:

A bus stop made by recycling old buses in Athens, Georgia, USA

Photo source:

Extraordinary use for bus stops

In Hamburg, Germany, some old people’s homes have come up with a novel idea to make Alzheimer’s patients feel better. They have installed mock bus stops on the compound. The restless patients wait for the bus to take them ’home’. When no bus arrives, they decide that they must’ve missed the bus and then after some time forget about the bus. But this ”exercise” makes them feel better.

Wait or walk

When taking the bus for just one stop or two, should you wait or walk – this is a big dilemma.

Scott Kominers, a mathematician at Harvard University, and his colleagues researched the problem and discovered that waiting for some time before walking is the best option.

In Aachen, Germany they put up a statue for this wait or walk theme.

Photo source:

This bus stop or bus shelter as they are called in the most northerly inhabited island, the island of Unst, Shetlands, UK probably is the most luxurious one in the world.

Photo source:

Bus Stop Humour

• On a poster outside a bus stop in England it says:  “Where will YOU be on the Day of Judgment?” Someone had scribbled below:  “Still here, waiting for a bus.”

• A meteorite fell on a bus stop in Düsseldorf, Germany and destroyed the bus stop. No one was hurt as this is only an advertisement for an insurance company.

Photo source:

Enjoy your bus stop!