Paris métro : 105 years of evolution

[Marla_Singer]

Hey everyone, I've made a massive work showing the evolution of Paris subway from the beginning to the end. It's a powerpoint document of 132 slides showing each development of Paris subway, from the opening of the line 1 the July 19th of 1900 to the extension of the line 14 to St-Lazare train station the December 16th of 2003. My problem is that such a collection of 132 maps is rather big (34 MBytes), hence, I can't upload it since I'm allowed of only 20MBytes of space online.


However, I've still uploaded a summary version of 22 slides showing the evolution of the métro every 5 years. You can download that version if you're interested, there it is :
The evolution of Paris métro (Powerpoint ; 4 MBytes)


Finally, here's a preview with the evolution of the métro every 20 years...

Paris métro by the end of 1900





Paris métro by the end of 1920






Paris métro in 1939 (before the invasion)






Paris métro by the end of 1960






Paris métro by the end of 1980






Paris métro by the end of 2005

​

 

[Birdjaguar]

Downloading now. Done.

Interesting, but from a foreigner's stand point it is lacking in a few things that would make it better. I'm sure full version has lots more detail that this 22 slide one.

• A date on each slide showing when the configuration was as pictured.
• A graphic that shows which areas were added since the last slide
• A tie in to the population growth of Paris and where the growth took place as compared to the expansion of the subways.
• The raw data of where the trains run would be enhanced by some additional notes on the implications of such expansions.

Nice job though.

 

[kryszcztov]

Interesting, thanks ! I agree with Birdie, maybe the full thing could reveal why some lines were added here or there, etc... I once saw the same thing about the subway in London when I went there (museum ?). It was funny to see that the first line there was that line going from the center to that northern bourgeois suburb !! Well, Line 1 in Paris also goes to Sarkozy's Neuilly-sur-Seine...

Marla, where can we get the whole pack ?

 

[Plexus]

I got to know the red line very well during my stay outside Paris this Summer.

 

[bigmeat]

Very nice and well done

 

[The Yankee]

Paris sure has a thorough system and one that is ever-expanding. A lot different than New York, where most of the subway lines here were built earlier and I wish they'd get in gear and expand some more.

 

[Kyriakos]

Why isnt there a line which covers only the center? In London the 'circle' line goes simply around metropolitan London, with the 'central' line going mostly straight in the middle of that circle. From memory though it seems that the Paris metro has a lot more stations than the London one, when London covers more than twice the space that Paris does. I wont even mention the metro at Athens, since i havent used it much. Athens definately looks better below the ground

 

[The Yankee]

I think the point would be to bring people from all around metropolitan Paris to the center and back out. Transfers seem to be availiable if you want to change lines and go elsewhere.

New York City doesn't have a line that merely goes around the "center" (unless you want to count the 42nd Street Shuttle that goes back and forth from Times Square and Grand Central), because there is no one small center and most of the people are from the outer boroughs anyway.

 

[SeleucusNicator]

Wouldn't this actually be a case of intelligent design rather than evolution?

 

[kryszcztov]

From memory though it seems that the Paris metro has a lot more stations than the London one, when London covers more than twice the space that Paris does.

Yes, but Paris isn't only about the Métro. If you look closely at the latest map, you'll see tramways (2 lines) in the close suburbs, already planned for extension, you'll see some RER lines (5 total, with many branches), the ones leading further into the suburbs. And don't forget the huge bus network, as well as the suburb train network (which stops at the main Paris stations, contrary to the RER which crosses Paris from one point to another). I don't know about you, but the extreme ends of some RER lines are so far away that it scares me.

 

[Rhymes]

hmmm. After looking at it I've come to the conclusion the Montreal's Metro really sucks

 

[Pontiuth Pilate]

And don't forget that the RERs connect up with the TGVs if I remember correctly. You can go all the way from Notre Dame Cathedral to the coast of Normandy simply by trainhopping.

 

[Taliesin]

hmmm. After looking at it I've come to the conclusion the Montreal's Metro really sucks

Nah, they're pretty good. Certainly much better than Toronto's.

 

[kryszcztov]

And don't forget that the RERs connect up with the TGVs if I remember correctly. You can go all the way from Notre Dame Cathedral to the coast of Normandy simply by trainhopping.

From Notre-Dame on the Ile de la Cité, just cross the Seine by foot and enter the station Châtelet, pick up line 14 (a métro without a driver, really fast, and always frequent), and stop at Saint-Lazare. There, pick up your train destination Normandy. Except that it's not a TGV there.

More generally you're right, but no surprise : even the local métro connects directly with the TGVs (Gare Montparnasse, Gare de Lyon, Gare du Nord, all inside Paris). But the RER takes you to both major airports (Orly & Roissy), and there are TGVs at Roissy too. (Roissy = Charles-de-Gaulle)

 

[Marla_Singer]

I think the point would be to bring people from all around metropolitan Paris to the center and back out. Transfers seem to be availiable if you want to change lines and go elsewhere.

New York City doesn't have a line that merely goes around the "center" (unless you want to count the 42nd Street Shuttle that goes back and forth from Times Square and Grand Central), because there is no one small center and most of the people are from the outer boroughs anyway.

Paris structure is actually very similar to New York's.

The only difference is that New York has incorporated 4 other boroughs to Manhattan when Paris hasn't changed its borders. However, the relationship between Paris and 3 neighbouring departments is very very similar to the relationship between Manhattan and the 3 neighbouring boroughs. It must be told here that the 3 neighbouring departments are made of buildings, they aren't about suburbian spreadings (that's the reason why I make the comparison with New York by the way).

Unfortunately, Paris has never been enlarged (at the opposite of New York). In the 19th century, many projects of subways elaborated on the model of London have been virulently rejected by Parisians because they were linking Paris to the rest of the city, peopled essentially by the working class. Finally, Parisians accepted the metro once they had the guarantee it wouldn't leave the border of the city. It's only in the middle of the 30's that Paris subway finally reached other parts of the city... but devellopments have never been truely ambitious.

Finally, we had to wait the RER (which came in the 60's/70's) to have a true network going out of the city, however the RER network doesn't reach only the 3 neighbouring departments but goes even beyond the metropolitan area. The line D and C even goes beyond the suburbia which is surrounding Paris and the three departments of the "petite couronne" (little crown). Hence, the RER isn't properly a subway, but an express subway at the center becoming a suburban rails afterwards. It's a hybrid system.


Anyway, all this to say that I praise a lot New York's subway. In my opinion, New York's subway is really not far to have reached the perfection. What I like is that in the same lines you can have express trains and "local" trains. The express trains have all the advantages of the RER, the local trains have all the advantages of the metro. It's a lot better than the London underground system, which is closer to Paris RER network to me, without any metro in the center. However, London cannot really be compared to Paris or New York as London is a lot less densely populated and more spread. Hence the tube system seems more adapted to London than it would be to Paris (I'd add "fortunately" ).

 

[Marla_Singer]

Why isnt there a line which covers only the center?

All lines of Paris cover only the center.

The metro don't go outside the historical borders of Paris, however the "city" (I mean the densely urbanized city, made of appartment buildings and not of housings) goes a lot beyond those historical borders of Paris. And the subway doesn't reach them.

In London the 'circle' line goes simply around metropolitan London, with the 'central' line going mostly straight in the middle of that circle. From memory though it seems that the Paris metro has a lot more stations than the London one, when London covers more than twice the space that Paris does.

Comparing London underground with Paris RER would be more accurate than comparing it with Paris metro. Indeed the purpose of London's tube is to join the city to the suburbs. However, as the RER goes really far in the suburbs it's not exactly the same thing, but it's a lot more comparable.

As I've said to the Yankee, London is a very sparsed city with a very small center compared to Paris, which is a lot denser. Hence a metro system as in Paris would be rather pointless in London.

I wont even mention the metro at Athens, since i havent used it much. Athens definately looks better below the ground

I haven't taken it, but it's a very modern metro right ?

 

[Marla_Singer]

Downloading now. Done.

Interesting, but from a foreigner's stand point it is lacking in a few things that would make it better. I'm sure full version has lots more detail that this 22 slide one.

I've done my best using powerpoint. I've tried to use the best powerpoint transition to make show where is the change, however a flash animation may be better than a simple Powerpoint document. Unfortunately I have stricly not idea on how to make flash animations.

• A date on each slide showing when the configuration was as pictured.

The date appears at the bottom left of each slides. As my stuff is made every five years, it's always the 31st december of something. It should be more visible you're right. Maybe I should use another colour than blue.

• A graphic that shows which areas were added since the last slide

That's a good idea. What exactly do you think as a "graphic" ? My idea would have been to make blink the changes so that they attract the eye, unfortunately I haven't found such a transition on Powerpoint. Once again, a flash animation may be more appropriate.

• A tie in to the population growth of Paris and where the growth took place as compared to the expansion of the subways.

[/QUOTE]That's a good idea however it would be more about Paris population decrease, than Paris population growth (!!). Indeed, there were 3 million people in Paris city in 1920 and there are only 2 million people today. It's the three neighbouring departments which have massively grown in population (and the suburbs also even beyond).

• The raw data of where the trains run would be enhanced by some additional notes on the implications of such expansions.

That's interesting but it would be a huge job ! There have been numerous expansions. However, I could add for instance some comments in special slides. Like those where the two competiting metro authorities (Nord/Sud and CMP) have merged in 1930, or when the RER has been founded and so on and so forth. Actually that's a great idea ! I'll try to find some space to add those informations.

Nice job though.

Thanks.

 

[The Yankee]

Paris structure is actually very similar to New York's.

The only difference is that New York has incorporated 4 other boroughs to Manhattan when Paris hasn't changed its borders. However, the relationship between Paris and 3 neighbouring departments is very very similar to the relationship between Manhattan and the 3 neighbouring boroughs. It must be told here that the 3 neighbouring departments are made of buildings, they aren't about suburbian spreadings (that's the reason why I make the comparison with New York by the way).

Unfortunately, Paris has never been enlarged (at the opposite of New York). In the 19th century, many projects of subways elaborated on the model of London have been virulently rejected by Parisians because they were linking Paris to the rest of the city, peopled essentially by the working class. Finally, Parisians accepted the metro once they had the guarantee it wouldn't leave the border of the city. It's only in the middle of the 30's that Paris subway finally reached other parts of the city... but devellopments have never been truely ambitious.

Finally, we had to wait the RER (which came in the 60's/70's) to have a true network going out of the city, however the RER network doesn't reach only the 3 neighbouring departments but goes even beyond the metropolitan area. The line D and C even goes beyond the suburbia which is surrounding Paris and the three departments of the "petite couronne" (little crown). Hence, the RER isn't properly a subway, but an express subway at the center becoming a suburban rails afterwards. It's a hybrid system.


Anyway, all this to say that I praise a lot New York's subway. In my opinion, New York's subway is really not far to have reached the perfection. What I like is that in the same lines you can have express trains and "local" trains. The express trains have all the advantages of the RER, the local trains have all the advantages of the metro. It's a lot better than the London underground system, which is closer to Paris RER network to me, without any metro in the center. However, London cannot really be compared to Paris or New York as London is a lot less densely populated and more spread. Hence the tube system seems more adapted to London than it would be to Paris (I'd add "fortunately" ).

New York hasn't expanded since 1898 though, when the four outer boroughs were consolidated and annexed by New York.

But you're right in that there were developments that connected the outer parts of the city to the center. This was especially true when the outer boroughs weren't yet completely developed. And while you do compare Paris to New York, another reason the trains here (subway then elevated) have gone to the outer boroughs of the city is because there were destinations people wanted to go to (such as Coney Island, later Yankee Stadium, the World's Fair in Queens).

The trains were built, most of them going to Manhattan. Then as the companies that developed these lines were consolidated into one entity, travel was made easier. It was like putting together a jigsaw puzzle.

The only borough that the standard subway system does not go to is Staten Island. It's the real suburban part of the city. It has it's own railroad from north to south, and that's it. A couple of city buses go over the Verrazano Bridge to subway stations in Bay Ridge, express buses from Staten Island go to Manhattan via Brooklyn, and the ferry goes from downtown Manhattan to Staten Island.

If you're interested to compare more, http://www.nycsubway.org has a lot of information on the development of the subway over time, as well as service changes in the existing system.

 

[Dida]

Isn't the Paris RER like the LIRR and Metro North in NYC?

 

[Marla_Singer]

Isn't the Paris RER like the LIRR and Metro North in NYC?

I don't know what Metro North and LIRR are, but if it's about suburban rail networks then no... the RER is really an express subway to me. Actually, the best comparison I have to the RER is London's tube (which is considered as a subway).

But if it was so simple it would be too easy. Actually, there's not one RER but two RER's. In Paris, the RATP manages the métro (subway) and the SNCF manages suburban rails. The line A and B of the RER are managed by the RATP and the line C, D and E (the E being brand new) are managed by the SNCF.

The line A, B and E could really qualify as express subway. However, the lines C and D are just suburban rails put together. They are divided in tons of branches going a bit everywhere, they go really far (leaving the metropolitan area) and at the borders of those lines the frequency of trains is very low (one train every 15 minutes). However, to be totally faire, there's a train every 2 minutes on rush hours on those lines in Paris center.

On the other side, the three other lines (A, B and E) are very similar to London's subway. Those lines don't leave Paris urbanized area, they are very fast, with a very high frequency on the whole line. The highest frequency is of one train every 90 seconds on rush hours.

It should also be noticed that the 5 lines of RER are not only used by commuters but also by Parisians. They are used as an express subway, to go fastly from one side of the city to another, a bit like are used express trains on New York Subway. That's why, without knowing what is "Metro North" in New York, I doubt it's comparable with the RER. The RER is fully part of Paris métro, you can't exclude one from the other. It's not something additional, but really something at the heart of the network.