The automation of Line 1, the Paris Métro’s oldest and most popular line, with 725,000 passengers per day, has been achieved without any major interruption to service. This technological change has become necessary to deal with the steady increase in passenger traffic.
With the automation, Line 1’s passengers will benefit from a more responsive and regular transport service, ensuring greater safety and comfort. One of the main benefits of automation is the line’s ability to react instantly to an increase in passengers and provide the number of trains required for the optimum operation of the line.
The automation is expected to improve commercial speed by 4% and because fewer trains will be needed for the same headway, will achieve 6% rolling stock savings. The system also has the potential to reduce minimum headway by 20%. Not having a driver’s cab will also increase passenger capacity by 6%, even without any headway improvements.
The installation of platform screen doors on all the lines’ platforms contributes significantly to the smooth running of the line, avoiding interruptions associated with track intrusions, while also enhancing passenger safety. The migration process combined both automatic and manually driven trains on the same line, with all trains automated since January 2013. It is a world first given the importance of the line.
The project to automate line 1, launched in 2004, is part of the huge modernisation programme that RATP will be undertaking over the next twenty years. The project will allow the company to meet growing demand and to satisfy its customers’ expectations in terms of safety, comfort, regularity, flexibility and information, at a time when RATP is seeking ways of anticipating and/or remedying network saturation.
