A little-known wasteland nearly 20 miles long, the Petite Ceinture (“little belt”) is an urban phenomenon: an abandoned railway built more than 150 years ago in the centre of Paris. At a time when cities everywhere are struggling for space, the future of this expanse of land, precious in its biodiversity as well as its prime location, is a contentious issue.
“Foxes and various other wildlife use the railway as a passage to get from one place to the other in Paris,” says nearby resident Denis Loubaton. “To chop the Petite Ceinture up and sell it off in chunks would destroy the wildlife that lives here.”
A treasure trove for entrepreneurs, graffiti artists and nature-lovers alike, the disused line – Paris’s last great green space – also serves as a haven for social recluses and a shelter for the homeless. Sixty-year-old Daniel has lived on it for almost two decades after deciding to withdraw from society; Marc from Russia lives in a glass-roof hut he built himself; Michel has chosen to retire into the darkness of his cave to indulge in crack cocaine.
The line is also dotted with entry points to the Paris catacombs, so it is not unusual for the bucolic peace and quiet to be disturbed by “les cataphiles”, as the city’s urban explorers are known, rising from the depths of the city’s underbelly through secret passageways.
Floating up above and diving deep below the French capital, the Petite Ceinture still boasts 17 stations (there were originally 29). Building started in 1851 and passenger and freight steam trains circulated on the railway from 1862 until it was forced into decline by the development of the Paris Métro and the widespread use of motor vehicles. By 1934, passenger trains were a thing of the past, and in 1993 the railway was completely abandoned.
“Back then, my neighbourhood, the Clignancourt section of the Petite Ceinture, was a real mess,” recalls Loubaton. “It was a dumping ground – people would even throw rubbish from their kitchen windows onto the rails. It also suffered from acute prostitution and crack cocaine dealing; something had to change to improve the area and to preserve this precious corridor of biodiversity.”
So, in 1998, Loubaton founded the Jardins du Ruisseau (“garden of the creek”) association with other residents of Villa des Tulipes, an idyllic cobbled lane nearby in the city’s 18th arrondisement. Established along one of the neglected platforms of the Petite Ceinture’s former Ornano station, the pioneering project has received worldwide acclaim. “We cleaned the entire area,” Loubaton says proudly, “before planting flower and vegetable gardens, and we organised all sorts of art events.”
The 20-year-old Association Sauvegarde Petite Ceinture (ASPCRF) also believes in keeping the track as one line, and is campaigning for the revival of public transport along the line to relieve the city’s overburdened metro system, stating on its website: “Our association considers that urban ecology doesn’t limit itself to planting trees, but must consider a broader approach to the city’s functions.”
The mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, has a more commercial vision for the land, however. While she backs the Petite Ceinture’s gentrification in the 15th arrondissement – it is now a green space that lends itself to strolling and jogging – her ambitious plans could see the railway’s many tunnels turned into cinemas, aquariums and the like – against the wishes of Loubaton and his supporters. The green space in the 15th, with its wooden platforms and elevators, is more reminiscent of the New York High Line project than the grassroots Jardins du Ruisseau. “The problem is that this sort of rehabilitation isn’t a mineral one and risks minimising biodiversity instead of supporting it,” Loubaton says.
Loubaton’s Jardins project has become a prime example of successful urban conservation: the garden, which comprises a chicken shed and beehives, is cared for by members of the association (now some 450-strong) and local schools – and the result is striking. Among the flowerbeds and allotments that run along the station platform people settle into chairs to read or play a game of Scrabble, while school children do their homework. Thanks to this community garden, over a decade down the line, the neighbourhood has experienced a second lease of life.
Across the platform, La Recyclerie bar sits inside the Ornano station. “Our objective was that nothing we use should be bought, but found,” says Martin Liot, a co-founder of Sinny & Ooko, the company behind the bar. The bric-à-brac style apparently appeals to the customers, as does the “eco-fun”, including the mini urban goat and chicken farm outside on the platform. “We want to see a return to a mutualisation of resources in an age where everything is thought of as disposable,” Liot says. Members of the Amis les Recycleurs (Recycling Friends) association, are able to borrow seldom-used equipment such as a raclette grill pan or a hand drill, while a handyman named René will repair your broken equipment.
But the Petite Ceinture is also nurturing even greater social impact: in the industrial Bercy-Charenton area of south-east Paris, a long-term night shelter for the homeless has been created inside six old sleeper train carriages.
Set up in 2008, the emergency shelter, run by Casp, saw 40% of its residents reintegrated into society last year alone. “It was a first for us and I think it’s due to the fact that this shelter isn’t as alienating as most,” says Rachid Ferchouli, the shelter’s director. “The fact that you’re half still on the street and half inside is vital, which is why the Petite Ceinture lends itself so well to our purpose.”
While the mayor of Paris’s precise intentions for the Petite Ceinture are still uncertain, the official owner of the abandoned railway, the RFF (the French Railway Network), is starting to sell off sections. Close to the CASP shelter, a housing project will absorb part of the old track, going against Denis Loubaton’s efforts to preserve its biodiversity. The city’s current urban housing crisis is leaving the future of this unique urban green belt, with its precious fauna and flora, looking decidedly precarious.
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