THE WORLD'S BIGGEST MUSEUM
Hello, everybody! France truly is the world's greatest open-air museum.
Welcome to Paris' 10th arrondissement,
the culturally diverse district
with thousands of ethnicities here in the heart of the capital.
Behind us, the gateway of Paris: Gare du Nord,
the oldest station in Paris.
It was dreamt up and built by the architect Hittorff
at the start of the Second Empire around 1865.
There's a great story behind this station
because there used to be a smaller one before,
it was no longer meeting needs, so it was taken apart, stone by stone,
and transported by rail to Lille
and today, Lille Europe station is the old Gare du Nord.
We're going to look at the epic history of this incredible station
which is quite simply, ladies and gentlemen,
the third largest in the world
and the busiest station in Europe.
Let's go visit it.
We're going to meet Séverine Lepere,
the station manager of Europe's most important station.
Thank you for having us and hello. - Hello.
Is it Europe's most important station? - It is. 150 million passengers a year.
STATION MANAGER
To give you an idea, 150 million passengers
is roughly the traffic you get at Gare de Lyon and Saint-Lazare station,
that's 1,700 trains a day
and around 300 international mainline trains that depart from here.
On the mainlines at rush hour, there's a departure every three minutes.
Underground with the RER between Châtelet and Gare du Nord,
we have the highest density of rail traffic in the world:
32 trains per hour, per direction.
It's busier than the subway. - That's amazing.
It's also the portal to the continent for the English.
And also for anyone in Belgium,
the Netherlands and Germany, since there's a night train to Berlin,
so it really is a portal to Europe
and we like to assert the fact that we are a European station.
It's a magical place for me as a regular traveler from Brussels.
When you come through here and see this incredible view behind us,
what does it do for you? Because this is unique to Paris.
As I said before, this is the nicest view in Paris,
maybe after the Eiffel Tower.
A station is also a place of dreams. - It is.
I don't come from a family of railroaders,
I came into this world as a bit of an outsider
and the more I experience it and work here,
the more I think I'm hooked.
I love to watch people waiting.
You get a glimpse of their lives as they wait and kiss each other
and I love watching from the balcony of the station.
What do you do here? What is a station manager?
I have a slightly old-fashioned, 19th century image of the role,
but this is an incredible empire with hundreds of employees, I suppose.
There are 1,200 SNCF railroaders working at the station
and around 3,000 people overall
like contractors, storekeepers, working at the station,
not all at the same time, but with shift work,
we're open every day from 4:30 am to 1 am.
Even at night, there's activity: we do maintenance, cleaning,
change billboards, so it never stops.
At the end of this year,
works should start in October if there are no delays,
we plan to renovate the entire facade and the corner pavilions of the station.
We're renovating all the statues.
All the statues on the station's facade represent the historical destinations
of Gare du Nord. We're going to restore the facade and its woodwork,
it's an 18 month project and we're investing around 5 million euros.
Thank you very much for having us
and for setting the scene for the biggest station in Europe.
Thank you. - You're welcome, see you soon.
There's an international element to this place
which is unique to this station.
What I like here is the space, it's not too cramped,
the platforms are big.
Big, airy, profound,
bright, but very cold in the winter.
I'm with Fabrice who sells tickets right here,
he's a sales representative and he's just clocked out.
Where do you sell tickets to? - Anywhere in Europe.
London, the Netherlands, Germany,
Belgium and all over France.
Gare du Nord is a trip in itself, right? - Yes.
With all the French people who go to London and live there
and all the Belgians who come and work in France or vice versa,
it really is a melting pot, all cultures are represented here
and I think that's a good thing for France, for Paris
as well as for the tourists and for us locals who live and work here.
So, you're happy at Gare du Nord station? - That's right.
Thanks very much, Fabrice. - Thank you.
Have a good rest. What time do you start tomorrow?
It's a slow day, I start at 8 am.
Bye. - Thanks.
I'm meeting Francis Chabot, hello. - Hi, Eric.
You're a TGV driver at Gare du Nord. - Yes.
There's the Eurostar, Thalys, other TGVs such as...
The TGVs that go to Lille, yes.
Do you only drive the Thalys? - No, there are different shifts.
We're based in Gare du Nord and only drive the Eurostar
and the Thalys at times.
When you're driving a TGV,
do you get to spend some time at the station or town you're going to?
I went jogging in Brussels this morning.
London is even better with the Thames and the parks,
it's pretty awesome.
That's part of the appeal of the job, staying over in London or Brussels.
Yes, it is because sometimes you meet up with your colleagues
or you meet people from other countries who speak another language
so you're forced to speak English which is interesting.
I'm into sports, so that's allowed us to go jogging in Brussels and London,
play football with the English, it allows you to build relationships.
What's it like to get to Gare du Nord in Paris?
What's unique about that...
Or is it the same everywhere? - For us, it's the huge glass roof.
That's the landmark for us, the glass roof here is impressive.
This fairly large hall in front of us.
Thanks a lot, Francis. - Thank you.
You shared your passion with us.
I suggest we head to a place nearby,
a few kilometers away, down this track heading northbound.
We're going to go to Landy in Saint-Denis
and it's kind of the garage for high-speed trains.
This is where they set things right again when trains get a little scratch.
Take a look.
Welcome to the EIMM, Landy.
The Industrial Establishment for TGV Maintenance
is Gare du Nord's garage.
DIRECTOR OF LANDY'S TGV ESTABLISHMENT
Our mission is to maintain hundreds of TGV train carriages,
Eurostar carriages, Thalys carriages and TGV carriages in France.
A thousand people are permanently working on this 24/7
to ensure the availability and reliability of TGVs
departing from Gare du Nord.
I'm a maintenance worker at Landy garage
and I work at the replacement site for large mechanisms.
The thing that differentiates TGVs from other trains is speed
which, of course, brings about many more cases
since it needs a lot more maintenance.
I'm assembling the transmissions
which will transmit the movement of the engine to the wheels.
Ladies and gentlemen, meet Jérôme. Hello, Jérôme.
You're a journalist and author of three books
on the history of railroads in France.
Yes, it's my passion.
We're in front of Place Napoléon III which I didn't know about.
It's pretty recent, it was renamed Place Napoléon III
because Napoléon III was one of the politicians
who was a driving force for railroads.
Let's walk in front of this cathedral-like station!
It's easy to miss,
but when you look up at it,
you can gauge just how architecturally ambitious it was
for that era. They wanted to draw attention.
Exactly, it's a demonstration of strength.
And an invitation to travel
because they made use of old forms of communication.
What did people think of the train?
It was an incredible adventure at the time,
much like the space adventure in the sixties.
I guess it must have shaken things up.
There were even towns such as Orléans which didn't want a train in the 1860s.
They didn't believe in it and were scared.
What did they say to avoid a railroad? - That it was bad for your health,
that you could get chest congestion in the tunnels, fall from the train,
that it would lead to unknown diseases, that it was dangerous for villagers.
They were scared of this new mythical path.
Travel times were reduced,
the world was changing and opening up
because the industrial world was blowing up in bourgeois society.
We're under this giant market hall, why were these made at the time?
For two main reasons:
first, they had to vent the fumes from the locomotives
and protect passengers from bad weather.
But there's also a more hidden reason which is architectural.
The architects understood that this was a new Paris,
particularly the engineers hired by the companies
who used iron masterfully to make an impression.
It was the nave of this new cathedral, of this new railroad adventure.
It's crazy because it could be compared to cathedrals,
there are a lot of similarities.
And then there are two rows of 19 columns inside this big hall
which are stunning columns.
They're very high and support the large hall
and were made by a Scottish company.
Here's their business name:
"Alston & Gourley's, the British Ironworks,
"Glasgow, 1862".
It's not that legible anymore, but it was the only company at the time
that was able to cast columns that were that high.
Jérôme. - Yes?
In the 19th century, what was this hall and Gare du Nord like?
It was determined by three classes.
The first class wouldn't mix with the others,
so, they would get their tickets here
and go to a waiting room reserved for first class.
Then came a second and third class.
But only once the train was built, the waiting rooms were opened
and people could go on the train. They didn't wander around the station.
It must've been pretty noisy with all the steam.
The world of steam is sound and fury,
the pile-up of carriages when the trains were built,
the whistles, the locomotives moving off, the steam puffing out,
we don't have all of that stuff anymore.
Thank you very much... - The pleasure was all mine.
..for helping us relive Gare du Nord's history.
Thanks. - See you soon.
Let's keep going.
It reminds me a bit of Eiffel's architecture.
I like the style of this station.
It captures the smells of Paris here,
the films we've seen all over.
I'd like to go to Valenciennes, what do you guys think?
Here. Is this going to Valenciennes? - Yes.
How are you? - Great.
You're the ticket inspector.
What are the various jobs of a ticket inspector?
You're a train crew member, so you get on the train,
but you also welcome people, right? - We do.
You have to know about the train and where it's connecting to.
TICKET INSPECTOR
Keeping passengers safe
is something a ticket inspector is also responsible for
and inspecting tickets.
What is interesting about this job?
What do you get from being a ticket inspector?
Do you get to travel a bit? See countries? What are the perks?
The perks are human relationships.
You answer their questions or issues,
that's mainly it.
When you're an inspector, do you get up and think:
Oh, God, where am I going to end up today?
Because anything is possible.
There are times where there may be harsh exchanges with angry passengers
because of a strike,
dodgy passengers that you'll have to deal with,
a pretty woman that you may meet,
anything is possible in the day of a ticket inspector.
That's what's great, yes.
Train operations are scheduled in advance,
we know the destinations we'll be doing,
but the enriching part of the job
is who you may meet and the surprises you get on the train,
positive and negative.
That's amazing. What are you, a brigadier? What's that for?
I speak several languages, Spanish, English and Portuguese.
It shows the languages the inspector speaks.
Thanks a lot, I know you have to get on. - Thank you, sir.
See you soon. - Goodbye.
What's going on with the extinguisher?
I feel like something's happening over here.
A fire extinguisher on the rails.
Could you get the train behind to stop and remove it?
And the 379 on rail B. - OK, thanks.
Keep me posted. - Yes.
I don't mean to disturb you, but what's going on?
He told us that there was a fire extinguisher on the rails.
A train driver called me to tell me. - OK.
What we're going to do is see if the train behind can remove it.
DISPATCHER
Can you see where it is? - Saint-Denis is here.
This screen manages the RER lines departing from Saint-Denis.
522 421 522.
OK, understood. - OK. What was the...
What's going on here? - This is the service room
OPERATIONS MANAGER AT REGIONAL CENTER
where we follow trains in real-time on all of the regional lines.
Yes, that's it. It's train driver 126345.
The role of these operators called dispatchers
is to ensure that traffic is running optimally in these areas.
Therefore, they're permanently in touch with the switchmen
as well as the train drivers.
Traffic is OK, there's no risk of damage, but it'd be better to remove it.
When you're working late and there's an issue,
they find out what it is and try to fix the issue.
Exactly. This is an operator who knows the infrastructure inside-out
so he knows that it's possible to pull over a train at a certain spot
which is behind schedule to be overtaken by a faster train behind.
You get the hazards of everyday life here,
from troubling situations to crisis situations.
So, you have the ability to halt everything if necessary,
you can say, "Stop the trains and everything."
This really is the "brain" of the system.
It is the brain of the system and what's interesting about this job
is making sure that everything runs as smoothly as possible.
Gare du Nord station is huge in terms of traffic and mainline traffic,
but let's not forget that 80% of daily traffic
comes from the RER and commuter trains.
Dominique, hello. - Hello.
You're the RER manager for lines B and D, right?
Exactly.
There are over 1,500 trains a day passing through Gare du Nord
for the suburban rail network alone.
This huge market hall was built not too long ago.
How old is this large glass roof? - Six years old.
It allowed us to rethink the whole space within this suburban rail station
with part of the station on the surface
for two suburban lines
and the underground part which has some of the densest traffic
in the world.
This station is a pretty big deal for folks living in the Paris region,
it's an extension of their home,
they see it every day and spend time here.
Folks from the Paris region spend 45 minutes of their time on transport,
so a certain sense of continuity is established here.
Over 115 stores have been set up
which are there to deliver a top service to our customers and passengers.
Thank you very much for showing us this underground part of the station.
My pleasure. Goodbye. - Bye.
We're at the end of platform 13 in Gare du Nord.
I'm with Antoine who's responsible for production,
so you basically deal with the train schedules.
The signal box is over there, it's that big, gray bar.
So, the railroad term for that would be switches.
There are hundreds of them here, so you can't screw up.
Exactly. Every time a train has to go right or left,
we move the switches.
You do more than Gabin in The Human Beast.
Exactly. - No need to move like that now.
Is it done on a computer?
Yes, it depends on the signal box technology.
But those signal boxes are a weak spot in the network
because you have to monitor them, check if they're working mechanically.
Do the railroaders check that regularly? - Exactly.
First, there are greasing operations which are particularly important
because that's what allows the switches to move.
The second operation involves maintenance
where they check that all of the switches
including its motors, switch points and linkages
are in top condition to ensure traffic flows safely.
IT will never be able to do everything. - Folks have to do the mechanical part.
Thank you, Antoine. - You're welcome.
Thank you for this walk down platform 13 in Gare du Nord.
Have a good afternoon. - Thanks.
Lille - Maubeuge - Dunkirk - Valenciennes - Brussels - Valenciennes.
We're in the nerve center of the mainline part of Gare du Nord
known as the Paris-Nord control room.
It's interesting because as soon as something happens,
railroaders and officials inform this control room
and they handle it in several ways.
Imagine a piece of luggage has been left abandoned in the station,
a message will immediately be generated
and displayed in the station so you can instantly see it.
You can also inform passengers with an audio message
which is blasted out to the whole station. Let's go.
I'm meeting Nilo, a Eurostar sales rep. - Hi, Eric.
How many London-Paris trips are there per day?
There are 15 trips a day.
How long is the journey? - Currently it's 2 hours 35 minutes.
With the High Speed 1 from November 14 2007,
it's 2 hours 15 minutes.
That's almost the same time as a Paris-Nantes journey.
Couples can get an extra 20 minutes in London.
I'm thinking about it, I might just go there.
So, you spend around 20 minutes in the tunnel.
Claustrophobics can't be fans of that. - It depends.
Do you get any questions? - One funny question I get
is customers ask if you can see fish when going into the tunnel.
No way. - They do.
Are there customers who ask that?
How do you answer that? - You laugh it off.
I say, "No, it's just a dark tunnel like any other tunnel."
What's the atmosphere like because the Eurostar
isn't quite like other high-speed trains.
It's chic, full of business types. - There are loads of businessmen.
A third of Eurostar passengers are businessmen.
Seventy percent of passengers are there for pleasure
and the rest for business.
The magical extravaganza that is the Eurostar is amazing.
The check-in part is a little like an airport, though.
It is.
It's the end of the show. Nilo, one last question.
What time does the next Eurostar leave? - The next Eurostar?
In 17 minutes.
Do I have time to board it? - Of course.
Thank you very much, Nilo. - See you soon.
It's the end of the show, thanks for joining us.
What are the take-aways? It's Europe's largest station
and the oldest station in Paris in terms of architecture.
Thanks for joining us. If you want to follow this program go to:
www.france3.fr
Just one more thing. There we go. Bye!