The City Of Lights Or City Of Bikes?

PARIS - Paris has become a city full of bicycles. On July 15, the City of Lights inaugurated a new self-service bicycle transit system called Velib to encourage the populace to choose leg power over automotive power. It seems to be catching on.

"Velib" is a combination of the French words velo, for bike, and liberte, for freedom. And they are everywhere. Bicyclists are plentiful, especially on center-city streets, and it's hard to walk more than two blocks without encountering a Velib station occupying what would have been six or seven parking spaces for cars.

On our last visit to Paris in the fall, my husband and I stumbled onto Velibs quite by accident on our way to find a Metro stop. They were beautiful bikes, fitted with sturdy cruising tires, big baskets, front and rear lights, padded adjustable seats and a welded-on chain, lock and key. We wanted one!

But getting one wasn't so easy. Each bike was locked into place on a rack with a self-service kiosk in their midst. The directions, in English as well as other languages, may as well have been Greek. They didn't make sense to us.

After watching helplessly as other people released a bike and took off, we got a Parisian to explain the directions, and we were off on our first day of biking on our first day in Paris.

And what a glorious ride it was. We saw more of Paris in our first four hours than most see in a week.

We rode from our hotel on the Right Bank across one of the numerous bridges spanning the Seine onto Boulevard Saint-Germain, the main drag of the Left Bank and a popular hangout in the early 20th century for poets, artists and writers, including Edna St. Vincent Millay and Ernest Hemingway.

It was a nostalgic ride for me. I found Hotel Lima, at No. 46 on the boulevard, a place where I used to stay when I was younger. Now remodeled and renamed Hotel Abbatial, it's still a good value.

After lunch at one of the innumerable brasseries along the boulevard, we saw Notre Dame Cathedral on the Île de la Cite, the Eiffel Tower and the nearby makeshift tribute to Princess Diana at the Flame of Liberty overlooking the auto route where she was killed. We joined a happy throng cruising along some avenues by the Seine that are open only to people and bikes on Sunday, and we finally ended up safely back at the Velib station near our hotel. It was exhilarating.

But even more important than how much we saw was how we saw it. There was a wonderful immediacy to the experience. We were like accelerated pedestrians trolling from one neighborhood to another, experiencing the change as a main thoroughfare clogged with small businesses and cars eventually gave way to a narrow residential street with quaint old brownstones. This soon fed into a busy boulevard where again there were businesses, but this time much bigger and more bustling.

We felt like we were part of the city, not tourists. On three separate occasions, strangers approached to ask directions while we were stopped at a corner. (Twice, we actually knew the answer.)

Velibs Equal Freedom

Paris is not the first city to support a widespread system of bicycling. Lyons, France, started one a year ago and Barcelona, Spain, began one in March. But according to Parisian newspapers, the system in Paris is the biggest and most comprehensive. At the time we were in Paris, there were 30,000 bikes in 1,500 stations, with 2,000 more bikes planned by year's end.

The system is centrally controlled by a computer, so you can take a bike from one rack and turn it in at another. In fact, the payment system is structured to encourage short rides; a ride of a half-hour or less is free. Once we figured this out, we became adept at going from place to place with a different Velib each time.

Like any new idea, there are kinks to work out. Racks on the edges of the city (such as in Montmartre) seem to be always empty, and the racks at popular spots in the center of Paris (such as the Louvre) seem to be perpetually full, so it's hard to find a place to park your bike. A fleet of small trucks that redistribute the bikes at the end of each day is an attempt to solve this problem. There is also the occasional defective bike, and, of course, the traffic.

Bicyclists must compete for space on the streets with pedestrians, cars, motorcycles and buses that seem bent on ignoring the Velib's existence. And even though there are more than 230 miles of cycling lanes in Paris, many are shared with buses that seem to make a special effort to pass with as little space as possible between them and the bike rider.

But regular riders, such as Emmanuelle Nuti, love it. We met her one evening standing in front of an empty rack of bikes near our hotel, contemplating what to do next.

"I think it's one of the best systems that this mayor Betrand Delanoë has added to the city yet," said the 30-year old native Parisian. "It conforms to its name. You really do feel free."

Naturally, in a city known for strong opinions, there are vocal opponents as well.

"There are too many cars, and the French don't respect the law. They cyclists don't stop when they should stop. People cross when they want to," said Paris anesthesiologist Anne Zubicki, whom we met at a gathering of local friends. "There's going to be a lot of injury. They don't wear helmets. We are waiting for all the head trauma."

But there's no evidence of widespread injury, and optimists abound.

"It is probably a good thing, and it is probably here to stay," said Zubicki's colleague Phillipe Girard, an ophthalmologist. "It needs to withstand the test of time, especially when winter comes."

How It Works

Directions are printed in English, as well as in several other languages on the kiosk in the middle of each rack.

With a credit card, you deposit 150 euros, a charge that's never collected if you always return your rental. Then you select a "subscription" of one day (1 euro), one week (5 euros) or a year (29 euros). The cost of the ride is then figured on top of this, based on the time the bike is out of a slot. The first half-hour is free; the second half-hour costs 2 euros and every additional half-hour is 4 euros.

For information, go to www.en.velib.paris.fr. Some parts of the Web site are in English.