Hi to those living in or familiar with Lausanne,

I´m in the process of planning the move and I would appreciate some feedback from those who are familiar with Lausanne about good places to live. I will be working at the EPFL so would like somewhere convenient to that. Don´t want to spend a fortune on acommodation (looking for 3-3.5 room) - just enough to have a decent place. Thus obviously living outside the city centre would be cheaper. I have a car but would like to have the option of using public transport or coming to work by foot or bike. I´ve been told that the areas Chavannes, Ecublens and Renens are convenient for EPFL. What I would appreciate is comments on advantages/disadvantages of basing myself in one of these places rather than Lausanne city centre.

Thanks

Hi,

I work at UNIL, right next door to EPFL. I live in Malley (just inside the Renens commune border) which is pretty much halfway between the Uni and the centre of Lausanne. I find it a really good compromise. If I want to I can easily take the M1 metro to uni (about 5 mins) or into town (again, about 5 mins). Alternatively, if the weather is sunny then I can take the beautiful walk to work along by the lake. There are also a couple of supermarkets (COOP & Migros) in the immediate vicinity. I don't know what the average rental prices are, but I pay just over 1k for a 2.0 apartment.

Hope this helps, best of luck,

Renens has the advantage of having a SBB train station, and it's also not that tough to find an apartment there. Chavannes and Ecublens are a bit quieter, but are still pretty well connected by public transit. As Sam said, living closer to the center of Lausanne wouldn't cause much of a problem for getting to/from work because the metro line will take you right there.

There are different community tax rates in Switzerland. So if you are earning a lot then do consider this option. Pully, Lutry, St Sulpice are few lower tax areas.
Ecublens is slightly lower in taxes than Chavannes, Lausanne and Renens.

Thanks everyone...this was exactly the information I was hoping for. What about for supermarkets etc in the suburbs...are they well served? Is the SBB station in Renens the end-point or do the trains continue to Geneva airport?? (apologies if this shows my poor geography). Hopefully like you Sam I will end up with something close to the metro line - this would be ideal...fingers crossed - apartment hunting will begin in earnest shortly

If you use map.search.ch then you can type in the address of any apartment you are looking at, click on the checkbox on the left that say "Shopping/Services" and look to see if any little yellow shopping carts appear near the circled apartment location.

As for trains, the fast intercity trains don't stop in Renens (but they all do in the main Lausanne station), but there are probably a couple of regional trains per hour that stop in Renens that will get you directly to Geneva airport in about 45 mins or so. Check the SBB website for schedule details, and click here to get a pdf of the map of the train network so you can get an idea of where everything is located.

I've found this website to be rather woefully inaccurate at showing you all the shops etc you need, although it is great for finding apartments and specific addresses. There are in fact many more supermarkets/minimarkets than those shown on the map. Wherever you live between Renens, Ecublens, Maladiere, Malley, Ouchy...all the way into the centre of Lausanne, there are supermarket-style shops only short distances from where people live. At worst, you can catch a bus for <10 min to the closest metro stop, and go for <10 min to the big supermarket areas (centres commerciales) of Ecublens, Malley or Lausanne-CFF/Flon whatever that place is called.

Oh that´s good to know. Thanks again "Lausanners" for the information and links