Paris Metro Line 11 (French: Ligne 11 du métro de Paris) is one of the sixteen currently open lines of the Paris Metro. It links to in Rosny-sous-Bois, in the neighboring department of Seine-Saint-Denis. Opened in 1935, line 11 was one of the last historical lines to be put into service, even after the first parts of lines 12 and 13. It was then intended to replace the Belleville funicular tramway, which closed in 1924. The line is 11.7 km (7.3 mi) in length with 19 stations.
Before its 2024 extension east from Mairie des Lilas, it was one of the least used lines, with less than forty million passengers in 2023, and also ran the oldest trains still in service, the MP 59. The RATP expects thirty-one million more in 2025 after the eastbound expansion.
During the 1950s and 1960s, the line was used as experimental grounds for innovations developed by the RATP. It was the first metro line in the world to be equipped with rubber tyres, back in 1956. It was also equipped with a centralised control station, and first welcomed automatic train operation on the Paris Metro, back in 1967. It was extended from to on 13 June 2024, almost doubling its length and adding six stations. A proposed extension to , despite being part of the original Grand Paris Express project, has been postponed indefinitely.
History
The supplementary network approved in 1909 provided for a short line linking the Place de la République to the Porte des Lilas. This section was declared to be of public utility (a must before starting construction works on public projects in France) by the law of 30 March 1910 but was not built straightaway.
On 29 December 1922, the Paris City Council relaunched the project and voted to create a line to better serve the working-class neighbourhoods of north-east Paris by connecting the Belleville district to the Châtelet district in the city centre. This line was intended to replace the Belleville funicular tramway and the bus lines in the north-east of the capital. It would connect Châtelet station (on Avenue Victoria) to the Porte des Lilas via the Place de la République and the Belleville district.
The line was originally intended to follow Rue de Belleville for its entire length, but a small route detour connected it to Place des Fêtes in order to provide a connection with then-Line 7, at the cost of passing under buildings for around . Similarly, it was planned to connect and stations through the shortest route as possible, with two stations under the narrow Rue du Temple, but the final route runs further west via and the new Rambuteau station.
The section from Place de la République to Avenue Victoria was declared to be of public utility by a decree of 14 May 1925. Work began in September 1931, with the exception of the structure under the Place de la République, which had been built at the same time as lines 8 and 9. It took place in fairly difficult conditions, as the line passed under narrow streets and the foundations of some buildings. The passages under the Coteaux collector, the Saint-Martin canal and above a tunnel on the Petite Ceinture, also proved tricky. Building the and Télégraphe stations also proved difficult due to their great depth - - and the fairly unstable nature of the ground, made up of inconsistent green clay. To the south, near the Seine, the line was built in alluvial soil containing a water table. Despite these difficulties, the infrastructure was handed over to the Compagnie du chemin de fer métropolitain de Paris (CMP) on 3 May 1934 after two and a half years of work.
Last line of the network created before old line 14, it had to pass under all the other metro lines, with the exception of then-line 3 at Porte des Lilas. Line 11 was inaugurated on 28 April 1935. On this occasion, (lines 1 and 4) and Pont Notre-Dame - Pont au Change (line 7) stations were connected by an underground corridor to the line 11 station, and united under the name Châtelet in 1934. The new line was -long and had twelve stations, all vaulted, with a platform length of . The line was then served by twenty-two four-car trains.
A first extension to Fort de Rosny was declared to be of public utility in 1929. But only one station was built from this project : , opened 7 February 1937, which became the 13th station and terminus of the line. The continuation of this extension was interrupted - then cancelled - by the Second World War. On 12 May 1944, the German army requisitioned the line to establish its underground weapons workshops and closed it to traffic altogether. Indeed, built at great depth, it was out of reach of the allied bombs. After the Liberation, the operation of the metro gradually resumed with difficulty because of the shortage of coal and therefore of electric traction current, but line 11 was the only one that remained closed as a result of serious deterioration of its infrastructure, including the removal of part of the tracks by the Germans. It was necessary to wait until 5 March 1945 for the reopening to the public after essential refurbishment.
The experiment of the metro line on rubber tyres
Experimentation with rubber-tyred rail vehicles dates back to the 1930s. Rubber-tyred equipment has the advantage of better acceleration and deceleration, which in turn increases the throughput of a line, which is particularly noticeable on a metro line with frequent and closely spaced stops. The technology also reduces rolling noise and vibrations, with the sole con of generating supplemental heat.
In 1950, the first tyres with metal reinforcement appeared on the market, capable of supporting a load of with wheels with a diameter of less than . The RATP conducted a test campaign in 1951 on the Voie Navette, with a prototype, the MP 51. From 13 April 1952, the public was admitted every afternoon to take the shuttle, which continued its tests until 31 May 1956.
The tests proving conclusive, it was then decided to use this technology on the short, winding and very steep line 11, on a full-scale secondary line before a planned network generalization.
The line was converted to run on rubber tyres during the nights from 1954 to 1956 to not disrupt the line's operation, at the cost of a service reduced by one hour in the evening. Four methods of laying of the tyre tracks were tried, responding to two opposing concepts :
Limiting as much modification works as possible by keeping the ballast supporting the track as it was. Taking advantage of the fact that the elasticity of the track support was no longer useful, being now supported by the rubber tyres, and thus removing the ballast altogether to eliminate the regular ballast re-tamping interventions necessary to ensure correct track geometry.
The T-layout consisted of bolting azobé bearing parts onto the sleeper heads placed on the ballast; the D-layout fixed the bearing parts onto concrete blocks or blocks cast onto the foundation raft; the I-layout was similar but with injection of cement mortar into the ballast and the S-layout was adopted in stations, with the azobé bearing parts resting on concrete walls cast onto the foundation raft. This latter arrangement improved the appearance and maintenance of the track and reduced the severity of accidents involving people (accidental falls onto the track or suicide) by the presence of a central pit.
The line was equipped with the new MP 55 sets from 1 October 1956 to November 1957 instead of the former Sprague sets, the last of which left the line for good on 11 October 1957. The first rubber-tyred train was inaugurated on 8 November 1956 and the new operation of line 11 began on 13 November 1956, the first day of commercial service. The old sets on the line were then gradually transferred as new sets were delivered, in order to strengthen the service on line 2, the trains of which were to be increased from four to five cars in June 1958. The surplus equipment allowed twenty-nine motor cars and thirty-seven trailers to be removed from service, most of which dated back to 1908 and 1909.
In 1967, the line was equipped with a centralised control centre and automated train operation, which was a first on the Parisian network. The MP 55 sets were gradually withdrawn from 1982 to 1999 and replaced by the MP 59 sets, from line 4. Line 11 had not seen any significant development since that date until the commissioning of the new centralised control centre at Bagnolet on 1 June 2021.
The use of rubber tyres and the steep gradient of the route make line 11 one of the hottest lines on the Paris network, alongside line 4.
As part of the extension of the line from Mairie des Lilas to Rosny-Bois-Perrier, most of the stations underwent renovation and adaptation work, including the creation of new access points. The rear yard at Châtelet, which was too short to accommodate the future five-car MP 14 metro trains, had to be extended in limited space under buildings. To carry out this exceptional work, it was necessary to temporarily terminate the line at Hôtel de Ville. The closure at Châtelet, effective on 18 March 2019 was supposed to last until 16 December, but the transport strike which broke out on 5 December 2019 almost completely paralysed operations on the line, so the line was not reopened until 31 December 2019.
Extension to Rosny-Bois-Perrier
The municipalities of Romainville, Noisy-le-Sec, Montreuil and Rosny-sous-Bois, as well as the council of Seine-Saint-Denis, had proposed a project to extend the line from to , an additional to be covered in 12 minutes, with the full journey taking, according to the RATP, 24 minutes from Châtelet to Rosny-Bois-Perrier, compared to 55 minutes at the time. This involved implementing in a new form the former expansion project, by then over a century old.
This extension allows an interconnection with the RER E, as well as direct metro service from Paris to the Rosny 2 shopping centre, a service then only available by bus and RER. One of the new stations, , also provides an interconnection with the future eastbound extension of the T1 tramway to Val de Fontenay. The metro line 15 east section, now set to open by around 2030, will also serve Rosny-Bois-Perrier, eventually allowing an additional transversal rocade connection at this station. All the new stations are accessible to people with reduced mobility and the new MP 14 rolling stock has been put into service on this occasion, in a five-car layout (instead of four since the line's beginning in 1935).
According to RATP studies financed by the 2000-2006 State-Region project contract (Contrat de plan État-région, CPER), this extension would increase the number of passengers on line 11 by 68,700 each working day. The public consultation launched in 2010 estimated the cost of the project at €820m, to which should be added €140m for the renewal of rolling stock and around €100m for the renovation of existing stations. The agreement approved by the STIF on 7 October 2015 set the financing requirement at €1,084m (Île-de-France region €500.3m; SGP €305.3m; State, €214.4m; Seine-Saint-Denis €64m) for the extension, to which must be added €214m (RATP €73m; Paris City €61m; Region €56m; State €24m) for the adaptation of existing stations, and an additional €151m by Île-de-France Mobilités for the rolling stock renewal.