wrote on 29 April 2009 12:26:51 ...
"Richard J." wrote in message
m...
Clive wrote on 28 April 2009 16:42:41 ...

[snip] ........ Paris has stations too close together
and their rubber tyre stock can throw you off balance when braking, like
Ligne 1 at Les Halles, the train brakes, enters the station then
accelerates then brakes suddenly to a halt.

In my experience the acceleration/deceleration of the rubber-tyred trains
is no worse than the Central Line, and your description of arriving at Les
Halles (it's Line 4 by the way) sounds just like the Victoria Line.

A bit OT, I think, but how often are often are Paris Metro drivers required
to manually operate their trains?

Whenever the (timetabled) service interval is more than 4 minutes. They
can optionally drive manually if the intervals are between 2 and 4
minutes, but my impression is that few do so.

I think that the whole system is on ATO.

More or less. Lines 1-9, 11-13 were converted to ATO (using existing
trains) between 1967 and 1979. Trains on lines 10, 3bis and 7bis are
driven manually.

Line 14 certainly is.

Line 14 is computer-controlled ATO, monitored remotely. There are no
drivers or other on-board staff at all.

--
Richard J.
(to email me, swap 'uk' and 'yon' in address)