Introduction
Begin: Gare Saint-LazareEnd: Anywhere on Line 14 or at Charles de Gaulle-Etoile if you divide this walk into two parts.This walk has both walking and riding parts. You’ll have to walk, of course, when you change lines, but I also ask you to get out of the system to see a few things or to take a break. This is how the instructions for the walk are organized: First, you’ll find a few facts about Le Métropolitain parisien (the Paris métro). Read the entire introduction, including the facts, before you start. (It’s not always easy to read while you’re zooming through a métro station, especially if you’re standing in the car and hanging on.) Second, the walk is divided into twelve segments. Each leg of the journey begins by telling you where to go and how to get there on the métro. When you’re outside the métro system, the walk information will be in the usual narrative format. Finally, at the end of the walk, there is a list of characteristics of the métro that you will hopefully be more aware of whenever you ride the métro in the future. Enjoy the métro; it’s an integral part of your Paris experience!Métro Facts• Paris saw its first métro in 1900. The goal was to open a modern, public transportation system for the Exposition universelle de 1900 (World’s Fair). Created in 1897, the Compagnie du chemin de fer métropolitain de Paris (CMP) built and managed the new métro. The métro opened in July 1900 with two lines: Line 1 (porte de Maillot –porte de Vincennes) and Line 2 (porte Dauphine–Nation).• Between 1900 and 1911, eleven more main lines and two sub-lines (3b and 7b) were added.• A competing métro company emerged in 1905, called the Nord-Sud (NS). In 1910, it opened Line A (Issy-La Chapelle), and in 1911, it opened Line B (Saint-Lazare-porte de Clichy/de Saint-Ouen). Both lines went north and south.• The NS merged with the CMP in 1930.• In 1948, the CMP became the Régie anonyme de transports parisiens (RATP). It is a financially independent business controlled by the government.• Line 14 (Saint-Lazare—Olympiades) is the newest line. It was opened in 1998—the only new line since 1911. Many lines, however, have been extended, and all have been modernized; examples include replacing tiles and adding safety barriers. Modernization of stations is constant.• There are no circular lines—all fourteen main lines have two terminals. Every line is independent—meaning the lines don’t share trains.• There are 383 stations or stops, about 3,500 métro cars, and more than four million riders per day.• The Réseau Express Régional (RER), like the buses, is a separate system run by the RATP.• The métro system is extremely safe: There are over six hundred police officers assigned to the métro. The RATP has over two hundred controllers (ticket checkers) and 850 security agents, and the entire system is under video surveillance. In the past one hundred years, métro train accidents have been rare.• The system is very dependable. Every line has a central control point from which the circulation of the trains and the supply of electricity are controlled. The trains do not run roughly between 1:30 and 5:00 a.m. Every station posts departure times for the last run of the night.• Electric motors power the trains. The electricity gets to the motors through a third rail rather than by an overhead line like French railroad trains.• In the 1950s and 60s, the RATP decided to finance the modernization of the métro by selling publicity space. At that time, the RATP lined many of the station platform walls with a metal skin to cover the original white tiles. We will see the results of this decision today: advertisements are everywhere in the métro, and there are still some metal-lined platform walls. In 1967, the RATP stopped using metal linings but continued aggressively selling advertising space.• A rounded-arch ceiling is characteristic of most métro stations. These stations are usually true tunnels, like the Abbesses station on Line 12 that goes deep under the hill called Montmartre. Built using an open-trench method, stations with a flat roof, like Concorde (Line 8), are close to the surface.• Location determines the name of most stations, according to the street, intersection, bridge, etc. There are notable exceptions where a station bears a person’s name, example: Montparnasse-Bienvenüe (Fulgence Bienvenüe was the father of the métro).• Once in the métro system, you may travel anywhere for the price of one ticket. Your ticket is valid until you go through the subway exit. Don’t keep your ticket in your pocket with loose change; the coins might demagnetize your ticket. Also, don’t throw it away when you get off the car; there are controls in the corridors or by the exit where you will need your ticket. If you don’t have a valid one, you may be fined!• Each line has a unique number (and a unique color on most maps). The terminal to which it is going determines train direction. Example: Take Line 12 (the Green Line) toward Marie d’Issy and get off (or change) at Concorde.Common courtesies on the Paris metro include: 1) not standing in front of the doors when they open. Stand to the side and allow passengers on the train to get off before you rush to get on; and 2) be willing to give up your seat to someone elderly, a pregnant woman, or someone traveling with an infant. Ask “vous voulez vous asseoir?” (Would you like to sit down?) This will earn you the respect of your fellow passengers.Robert Erickson
#1 Saint-Lazare métro station
Enter the Saint-Lazare métro station. Even if you get to the Saint-Lazare Train Station on the métro or the RER, you need to exit and go outside to the front of the train station to place du Havre—facing the train station, enter the métro on the far right end, near the sculpture made of clocks. Do not use the new, glass-covered entrance. (This may sound weird, but I want to show you something you will only see as you come into the métro station from place du Havre.) Now, go into the métro station to the area where you buy métro tickets at the ticket windows.This Saint-Lazare station métro entrance is unique: First note its vaulted ceiling (rotonde). When there were two separate métro systems, the Saint-Lazare station was where rides on the NS métro could change to the CMP métro and vice versa. You are now standing in the entrance to an old NS station. Before you go down into the métro, note the colors of the ceramic tiles: green and white with some brown on the columns. The NS used the green tiles and the CMP used the brown.
#2 Métro station architechtural elements
Take Line 12 toward Front Populaire (which will be Marie d'Aubervilliers starting in 2021 with the planned line expansion). Can you tell Saint Georges was a Nord-Sud station? You can see NS in the green tiles around the advertisements. Get off at Pigalle to change lines. At Pigalle, take Line 2 toward Nation. You want to get off at Jaurès and exit the system.At Anvers (the first station after Pigalle) an open-air, aboveground section starts. There are twenty-six aboveground stations in the system. Most of them are on Line 2 (in the north) and Line 6 (in the south). At Barbès-Rochechouart (the second station after Pigalle), note the glass and steel construction of the aboveground station. These materials might remind you of la tour Eiffel (Eiffel Tower), or the large roofs of the older Paris train stations, or the roofs of the Grand Palais and the Petit Palais.
#3 Rotonde de la Villette
Exit the métro system at Jaurès, and go down the stairs to boulevard de la Villette. Now would be a good time to consult the map. Walk north (the opposite direction you were going on the métro) to Rotonde de la Villette, the round building on Place de la Bataille de Stalingrad.Rotonde de la Villette is a tollhouse built by Claude Nicolas Ledoux. In about 1780, the tax collectors convinced Louis XVI that Paris needed to be surrounded by a wall to control imports and collect taxes. (As if Louis XVI didn’t already have enough problems!) The wall was fifteen miles long and eleven feet high, and at each of the sixty gates, there was a tollhouse. Ledoux didn’t want any two adjacent tollhouses to look alike, and he designed each one to look like an ancient temple or pavilion using forty-five different plans. As you may imagine, Parisians deeply resented the “tax wall” and tollhouses. As the French Revolution began, many tollhouses were attacked, some before the attack on the Bastille! Eventually, all but four of the tollhouses were torn down. You’re looking at one of the four.What does this have to do with the métro? I’ll tell you: Inside the eleven-foot wall, there was a forty-foot-wide strip of vacant land. Outside the wall, there was a 200-foot-wide strip of vacant land. In addition, outside the wall, all buildings had to be at least 325 feet away. The destruction of the wall began in 1859. This had an important impact on the development of Paris because it left a significant amount of land available for boulevards and new construction. Rotonde de la Villette was a tollhouse at one of the major entrances into the city. From the rotonde you may look down two major boulevards built where the wall once stood: boulevard de la Villette(to the south—the direction you just came from) and boulevard de la Chapelle (to the west). Many of the aboveground sections of the métro system were built above these relatively new boulevards.Take a few minutes to walk around the nice park and look at the bassin de la Villette—part of the navigable Paris waterway system—and the two locks on the southeast side.
#4 Stalingrad Métro Station
Cross avenue de Flandre. This avenue is to the north of the square in front of the park. (Check the map if you’re turned around—remember north is at the top of the map.) Follow the métro tracks on your left along boulevard de la Villette to the Stalingrad Métro Station. Go down into the métro at Stalingrad and take Line 2 toward porte Dauphine. You will need to exit the system at porte Dauphine (the terminus).On your way to porte Dauphine, note the colorful tile work at Charles de Gaulle-Étoile station. Also, note the decorative tiles on the platforms at Victor Hugo, the first station after Charles de Gaulle-Étoile.
#5 Porte Dauphine
Leave the métro at porte Dauphine by taking the exit for “Boulevard de l’Amiral Bruix, Avenue Foche—côté numéros pairs” and going onto avenue Foche. If you are not already there, cross over avenue Foche and boulevard de l’Amiral Bruix to the glass-covered métro entrance.Just as you start up the stairs to leave the station, you will see two plaques that focus on Hector Guimard and art nouveau. Take time to read them. Guimard designed many bouches de métro (métro entrances); you will see another one later in the walk. Go to the top of the stairs. Guimard designed the lovely, glass-covered, art nouveau métro entrance you are now in (and designed Castel Béranger— see Walk 13). Go outside and take some photos.
#6 Charles de Gaulle-Étoile
Using the underground passage you were just in—the passage that has the glass-covered art nouveau entrance—go back to the porte Dauphine Station. Take Line 2 toward Nation, getting off at Charles de Gaulle-Étoile.If you are worn out or feel like a mole in a hole, you may suspend the walk here. Don’t forget, however, to come back to the walk another day. When you come back, restart the walk with Tour Stop 7 at Charles de Gaulle-Étoile or Tour Stop 8 at place d’Italie.
#7 Pont de Bir-Hakeim
At Charles de Gaulle-Étoile, take Line 6 toward Nation (par Denfert-Rochereau). It’s important to take Line 6 to Nation because Line 2 also goes from Étoile to Nation. If you’re on the right line, the first stop after Étoile will be Kléber.Note that the Passy station, the fourth stop after Étoile, is half above ground. After Passy, the train crosses pont de Bir-Hakeim, the only bridge in Paris that accommodates pedestrians, cars, and the métro. As you cross the bridge, you will see the tour Eiffel on the left. This is a relatively long ride with several aboveground stations—also built above boulevards created when the tax wall was torn down. Enjoy the interesting steel and glass construction. (During this long ride, if you get bored, read, talk to a friend, or take a nap—just do not miss place d’Italie.)
#8 Italie Deux centre commercial
Exit the métro system at place d’Italie. It’s time for a break, so take Sortie #2, avenue d'Italie (Grand Écran) out of the métro. This will put you in front of Italie Deux centre commercial (a modern, Paris-style mall). Enter the shopping center under the "Centre Commercial" sign.The restrooms are downstairs in Italie Deux centre commercial. Go straight down the hall on your far right, down the stairs in the center of the walkway, and follow the main hallway. The toilettes are on the left. There are many stores and shops where you may indulge yourself with a treat—some chocolate or a pâtisserie (pastry), maybe!As you exit the mall, note the two bouches de métro (métro entrances). Hector Guimard designed the entrance with the art nouveau lampédaires (lights) that look like a praying mantis (the same architect who designed the large covered entrance you saw at porte Dauphine). His greatest successes were his famous entrances to the Paris Métro that you will see all over Paris—several entrances to the Cité Station near Notre Dame, for example.
#9 Bastille Station
At Place d’Italie, take Line 5 toward Bobigny and get off at Bastille.As you go through the Gare d’Austerlitz, you will see the train station’s steel and glass ceiling to the left of the métro. When you get off the Line 5 train at the Bastille station, look for the remains of the foundation of the Bastille prison (vestiges de la Bastille) along the platform—this is all that is left of the prison associated with the beginning of the Révolution française (French revolution).
#10 Bastille Station: Révolution française
At Bastille, take Line 1 toward Château de Vincennes, getting off at Gare de Lyon (the first stop).As you wait for the Line 1 train in the Bastille Station, note the scenes depicting the Révolution française on the wall of the facing platform.
#11 Line 14
At Gare de Lyon, work your way through the maze to take Line 14 toward Saint-Lazare or Olympiades. This is almost the end of the walk. Before you get onto Line 14, you need to plan where you want to get off so you may get home or to wherever you’re going next. You have access to several lines from Line 14. Once you know where you want to get off, get on Line 14.Get off Line 14 according to your plan. Au revoir et à bientôt!Opened in 1998, Line 14 is the system’s newest, most modern line. Note the absence of a driver; the line is entirely automated. The train cars are joined on this line, and you may walk from one end of the train to the other. Walk to the front of the train where you will see the tunnels from a new perspective.
The End
After the WalkIf you ended the walk after porte Dauphine, make sure you ride Line 14 at least once. It’s the newest and most modern line in the system. You might want to learn more about the métro. The last time I checked, the story of the métro was presented in an interesting way in the Hôtel de Ville métro station. This is probably a station you will visit often, so take a look sometime.You may want to look for the following characteristics as you go into the stations and ride from place to place:• Color of the tiles in the hallways and stations (white, green, brown, etc.).• Types of wheels on the trains (metal or rubber).• Shape of ceilings over the platforms and rails (rounded-arch or flat).• Walls along the platforms (tiled or metal-lined, plain or decorated).• Types of trains (separate or connected cars).• Entrances into the system (art nouveau or ordinary).• Types of stations (underground or aboveground).• Anything unusual you might see. (Share it with others!)
