Bonus Blog – Oddities of the Paris Metro

Paris’ Metro network is wide reaching across the city and its suburbs with 16 lines spanning the city along with the five lines of the RER. During our stays in the French capital I was able to take a ride on 15 of the 16 lines (annoying I know!) and took the opportunity to explore some of the Oddities of the Paris Metro.

Whilst the Paris Metro has 16 lines, they are numbered Line 1 through to Line 14, with two oddities hidden within the list. Lines 3bis and 7bis aren’t deemed worthy of their own numbers and its with these we start our exploration of the Paris Metro oddities. Line 3bis is the shortest (at 1.3km)and least used of the 16 lines with an average of just 1.6 million users per year (around 4,600 per day).

Line 3bis was originally built as an extension to Line 3, however in March 1971 was given its independence at the same time as Line 3 was extended to Gallieni. At its southern terminus, Gambetta, there is a feel similar to Bank’s Waterloo and City line platforms in London. On my visit there was a train stabled in one of the two platforms whilst terminating services reversed in the other. It was also very clear where the old connection between the line and Line 3 once ran, with a foot tunnel now connecting the two.

There is still a rail connection between Line 3bis and Line 3, although this now branches off to the north of the 3bis platforms and loops round to the Line 3 running tunnels to the east of Gambetta station. The northern terminus of Line 3bis at Porte des Lilas is very similar to the old layout of Kennington on the Northern line in London with terminating trains running round a loop from one platform to the other.

At Porte des Lilas there’s also two disused platforms and some rarely (if ever) used connections to the former branch between Line 3bis and Line 7bis via Haxo. Haxo is an oddity in itself, having been constructed along with the rail connection in the 1920s but never used as a passenger station. There is however a study taking place to investigate merging Lines 3bis and 7bis, at which point the connection would be used and Haxo station may finally open to passengers.

Currently to travel between the two lines there’s the need to take a short, two station hop on Line 11 from Porte des Lilas to Place des Fêtes (or vice versa). Place des Fêtes is on Line 7bis’ own one-way loop, with trains running anti-clockwise from Botzaris to Botzaris via Place des Fêtes, Pré-Saint-Gervais and Danube.

Between Place des Fêtes and Pré-Saint-Gervais are the other ends of the unused connection between Lines 3bis and 7bis, whilst there is also a rarely used second track that runs from Pré-Saint-Gervais to part-way between Danube at Botzaris. At the western end of the line, 7bis connects to Line 7 and was once part of this line. The lines separated in 1967 after Line 7 had been extended to Porte de la Villette.

In the centre of the Metro network between Republique and Grands Boulevards there’s another oddity in Lines 8 & 9 which run in separate tunnels and have separate platforms but run along the same subterranean bit of Paris. It reminded me a bit of how the Circle, Hammersmith & City and Metropolitan lines all share part of the London Underground, however given Lines 8 & 9 use different tunnels, it’s a bit harder to hop between the lines.

Across in the west of the city there is another one-way section of track, this time on Line 10. This part of the network provides two oddities, the first being Eglise d’Auteuil, the network’s least used station. Being served by only westbound (away from the city) trains, just 172,812 passengers used the station in 2016, an average of just 473 per day.

Having exited the network at Eglise d’Auteuil I had a short walk at street level to reach the nearest station on Line 10 being served by eastbound trains, Mirabeau. This is home to probably the most famous of the Metro’s oddities as whilst only served by eastbound trains, you can sit and watch westbound ones as they essentially climb through the station on their way to Eglise d’Auteuil. Whilst its certainly not unique to have stations serving trains in only one direction in Paris, I don’t think there’s anywhere you can watch them going in the other whilst waiting.

Hopefully next time I’m in Paris I can work out a plan to take a ride on all 16 of the Metro lines and the 5 RER lines and find some more oddities to share, but for this post that’s unfortunately it. There’ll be plenty more posts coming about our time in France so keep tuned!