Having zone-extensions for transit passes, recycling services for newspapers, and air conditioning are the top three desires of the 11,000 comments posted on the Paris’ transportation website. The Régie Autonome des Transports Parisiens, known by the acronym, RATP, for about a year, has hosted an online forum on the wants of the millions of daily transit passengers. Vous-et-la-RATP (You and the RATP) has been a way for passengers to have their voice heard on how they would like to see their transit system in the next coming years. The RATP just released its five-year Plan d’Entreprise, based off ideas from both RATP employees and passengers, stating its vision and goals as a transit system in 2012.
“Aimer la ville,” French for “Love the city” has become the motto for the RATP, as the transit systems engages itself to build a more “lively, strong, harmonious, and sustainable city.”
The RATP hopes to increase its customer satisfaction. Already there are
1.516 billion annual rides taken on the Parisian transportation system, which includes Métro, bus, tram, and RER suburban rail. Millions are daily, loyal riders to the network, but the RATP would like to guarantee a certain “attitude de service.”
Communication to passengers is key when providing adequate transit service. The RATP has been implementing SIEL, a system that tracks buses and trains by GPS, in stations and their online site. Service updates are now regularly posted online (even during strikes) and are updated throughout the day. But these services remain just in French. In the future, the RATP wants to communicate in four different languages to its passengers and deploy bilingual agents to busy stations to help confused tourists.
A major desire that appeared on the Vous-et-la-RATP forum is improved connectivity between suburban communities. This also was mentioned in the five-year plan. In the last 25 years, the number of suburb-to-suburb trips has grown by 50%. The RATP, in response to the initial comment made on the Vous-et-la-RATP forum, has admitted that public transit between suburbs remains “weak." The current system requires most to connect trains in central Paris in order to travel from one suburb to another. The transit agency plans to study transit corridors that could potentially provide easy connections between suburbs (while bypassing Paris) and relieve congestion off the current network.
With a Métro system over a hundred years old, Paris has large plans to "de-saturate" the congested subway network. Line 1, the busiest Métro line, which carries over 161 million passengers per year, will become automatic by 2012. Three lines will have a new signaling system in order to run trains closer together.
Paris has taken large strives over the last few years to improving and extending its service. The next five years seem promising.
