Does a city’s transportation represent its city? Are metros like the cities they’re made for?

Not really, at least not when looking at London and Paris. It is rather strange, that Paris’s metro is dirtier than most others. After all, above ground, most of Paris is one of the most pristine cities out there: the marble, the statues, the leafy boulevards and criss-crossed streets; go below and it’s the grime, the noise, the police, and the smells. If you go to Chatelet — the largest station in the world–  just try to spend more than ten minutes there, moving past people, going on endless ramps that tell you it’s going one way to lead you somewhere else, or shake off the nagging feeling that you’ll get mugged. Any longer, and a deadening feeling starts to sink in; this isn’t a metro station, it’s purgatory. If you’re going to get pickpocketed, it’ll probably be there, and if you find yourself there after ten PM, get ready for some of the worst smells of your life. Yeah, I wasn’t the largest fan of Paris’s metro when I got here. It didn’t shape up well against the sleek new models in London, and its metro plan– centering everything around the right bank, leaving the left bank disconnected– seemed counterintuitive. Paris’s metro doesn’t become impressive until you start using it on a daily basis. Because the Paris metro benefits your average, day-to-day Parisian more than the London tube does for your average daily Londoner.

It seems to go against the image the two cities cultivate for themselves: on paper, London has always been the ‘business’ city– the orderly the in-sync, the content over style– while Paris is the aesthetic– style always style, beauty and joie de vivre over efficiency. I’ve found these stereotypes more or less true in other aspects, but with their transport these things seem to reverse. Pick a place in central Paris; you’ll find a metro station within a three minute walk of it. Guaranteed. Sometimes you’ll be on the metro for a while, jumping lines because the connections might not make much sense, but you’ll get there. London’s stations are much farther spread apart, sometimes walking as much as twenty minutes away to grab it. The first thing you’re hit with, of course, is the price: in Paris, a ticket is 1.70 euro and 1.30 in a book of ten, while London it’s upwards 2.70 pounds; in Paris a monthly pass for students is 30 euros, in London it’s above 80 pounds. And where does this extra money go? All right sure, it’s very fancy, but does the higher price make it faster, more efficient? Not really: the tube is famous for breaking down, while the worst I’ve seen using the Paris metro has been the occasional slow-down (except the 12– stay away from the 12). It’s funny because I walked away loving the London metro (see blog 4), but the more I think about it, the more I find that London’s is ideal for tourists. Paris, having the busiest metro system in all of Europe, is for the day-to-day.

So no, the metro doesn’t exactly represent what Paris ‘is all about’. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t have a life of its own. You see all types of people riding the trains: the suits going towards La Defense or the homeless who ride it all the time, the old women who cluster near the exits or the students drinking around the poles. After a while patterns begin to emerge (the 3 line off near the suburbs always have the crazy drunk men who yell at you, the 1 line has the best dressed people in Paris), and things start to make sense. I can only ride the metro so much; being underground too long starts to make me feel strangely stressed. But the Paris metro is for everyone, and it’s fascinating to watch how those groups interact (or don’t– the amount on smart phones is a little depressing).

In the end, it’s the velib that makes my four months here. Velibs are a system of bikes run by the city of Paris, with stations all over the city to which bikes can be taken out; it costs 30 euro for a year pass, but then the first half hour is free every time. Many cities in Europe have a system like velib, but Paris goes one step further by sporting the most stations of any city. It’s noticeable: there will be at least one station every three or so blocks everywhere in the city (particularly around universities or tourist sites). Suddenly, I have free transportation. And it’s amazing. On a purely practical level, velibs are awesome because you can grab one after a night of clubbing– four in the morning after the metros have stopped– and not have to take a cab. There’s nothing worse than timing your class perfectly, only to get to school and finding all four stations near Sciences Po full, but then, there’s nothing better than finding that last working bike after a long night out.

Of course, it goes further than that. When I’m on a velib I start to understand the workings of this city. I remember that first time I activated my card. Riding down past the marble, the balconies, and the intersecting cars, it felt like Paris was showing me a totally different side. A crazier side. In many ways bikers rule the Parisian roads: they’re “allowed” to be cars, busses, pedestrians, or just insane when it suits them– red light? only for cars if you’re not gonna get killed. Cut to Rue Rivolli at rush hour, skidding past the cars that are leaning sideways because they’re all too important to wait in line, or to swinging round the five separate streams of traffic of Place Bastille. There haven’t been many times I’ve been more exhilarated. Or at the end of a night biking past Place Concorde at three in the morning, when the gold obelisk links with the Arc de Triomphe at the far end. It’s Paris’s beating heart. Remember what I said about Paris being a real ‘big city’? It’s never truer than when I’m on a velib. Just taking the metro all the time is bad because it robs a person of context: sure they can get from point A to B, but do they actually know what the city between Invalides and Republique is like? how it moves, how it works? Whether it’s on the wide boulevards or the narrow alleys, velibs give me Paris. And strangely enough, it may just be my favorite consistent part of this whole exchange.