Paasitorni

Frozen Rails 2014 will take place at the same venue as the last conference: Paasitorni (Finnish for "Boulder Tower").

Built in the first decades of the twentieth century, Helsinki Congress Paasitorni is a unique conference centre right in the heart of Helsinki.

Paasivuorenkatu 5 A, Helsinki

Tickets include full access to the entire conference, as well as free breakfast, lunch, and delicious snacks on both days.

If you're arriving by car, see Paasitorni's parking information for nearby parking spaces.

All the areas of the venue that will be in our use should be fully accessible to disabled visitors. For details, see Paasitorni's accessibility information.

Helsinki

Helsinki is the capital and the largest city of Finland and in 2014 it is the design capital of the world.

Getting here

Getting to Helsinki is easy. Finnair and several other airlines fly straight to Helsinki from numerous cities in North America, Asia, and Europe. Alternatively you can take a train from Moscow or Saint Petersburg, or take a ferry from Tallinn or Stockholm.

Getting around

Getting around and about in Helsinki is best done via public transportation. See the HSL site to find more information about public transportation in Helsinki (1–7 day tickets recommended).

You can use the rather good Reittiopas (Journey planner) site to figure out the best connections for yourself. The journey planner covers local buses, trams, local trains, and the Suomenlinna ferry. Data from Reittiopas has laso been integrated into Google Maps.

Taxis are expensive here, but on the positive side the cars are new and clean and service is generally very reliable and safe. Taxis in Helsinki can be identified by the yellow sign on the car roof (it should be lit when the taxi is available). Most major credit and debit cards are accepted in taxis, although it would be good to mention while ordering that you wish to pay with Visa Electron. For more information, see taksihelsinki.fi.

For more information about Helsinki, visit visithelsinki.fi

* Paasitorni is not actually a fortress.

Hotels and accomodation

This year we don't have any special deals from hotels for our participants as we couldn't get a significant enough discount and only a handful of people used our discount code last time.

The closest hotels to the venue are the Scandic Paasi, Cumulus Hakaniemi, and the Hilton Helsinki Strand.

The venue has excellent connections for public transportation, so hotels in the city centre or elsewhere nearby can also be perfectly good options. You can use the HSL Journey Planner to check connections beforehand.