Ding Bat wrote on 09 Dec 2016 at 04:47 ...
Free mass transit in Paris while smog persists
http://www.thelocal.fr/20161208/pari...-million-a-day

It's been an interesting time in Paris transport-wise for the last few
weeks. After very high pollution levels last week (when London levels
weren't much lower), the Mayor of Paris was pushing for restrictions on
road traffic, and was furious that the police wouldn't act until Tuesday
this week (6 Dec). Since then, vehicles have been usable only if the
last numeric digit on the number plate matches the odd/even status of
the date, and through transit of Paris by heavy vehicles was banned,
though there were exemptions for public service vehicles, taxis, food
deliveries, etc. etc., and (fortunately for me for my return to London
yesterday) foreign-registered vehicles. Speed limits throughout
Ile-de-France (Paris region) are currently 20 km/h below the posted limit.

There seemed to be a lot of non-allowed vehicles on the roads (Le
Parisien newspaper estimated 25%) and the police were handing out
thousands of fines at various check points around the city.

Buses, trains, the Métro were all free, as were Vélib (city bike hire)
and Autolib (ditto for electric cars). However, the bliss of free
trains was marred somewhat by an RER B train brringing down a kilometre
of catenary on Tuesday in the morning peak, stranding 8 packed commuter
trains whose passengers had to walk along the track to the nearest
station. SNCF laid on 5 TGV trains to provide a service to CDG airport
using unaffected tracks.

This was only a few days after a (newish) MF01 Métro train was derailed
on one of the elevated open sections (line 2) when a heavy item of
electrical equipment fell off the train and derailed it. No casualties
thank goodness, but alarmingly similar to the Chancery Lane derailment
in 2003. (Managed to get on-topic eventually!)
--
Richard J.
(to email me, swap 'uk' and 'yon' in address)