Metro

“Anything new attracts criticism; you shouldn’t always believe what you read in the papers”. That was the motto of Fulgence Bienvenüe (1852-1936), the creator of the Paris metro. This Breton engineer, the thirteenth child of a notary from Uzel, was a man of character, obstinate and discreet. It was he who came up with the crazy idea of building, as he put it, “a metropolitan railway to facilitate travel within Paris”. While Bienvenüe did not invent the underground railway (the world’s first underground network had already been built in London), he was nevertheless the patient driving force behind the Parisian project, and for 35 years presided over the development of the metro.

The countdown began with the “declaration of public utility” issued in March 1898. The aim was to open the metro in time for the Universal Exhibition to be held in Paris in 1900. And so an enormous construction project began, which saw the streets of Paris ripped up, much to the disgruntlement of many Parisians. Complaints flooded in and there was widespread opposition to the project.

By 14 April 1900, the work was nearly complete, but the Universal Exhibition opened without the metro. The opening to the public of line 1 of the metropolitan railway, scheduled for 14 July 1900, would be delayed for a few days due to an external factor: an omnibus strike sparked fears that too many people would try to use the metro. The metro was finally opened on 19 July at 1 p.m. The President of France was not in attendance, preferring to travel to a naval assembly in Cherbourg! The metro entered into service in discreet fashion, carrying anonymous passengers alongside some adventurous journalists.

It quickly became popular with Parisians. The pugnacious Fulgence Bienvenüe continued his project, overcoming failures, unforeseen setbacks and catastrophes such as the 1903 fire at Couronnes, which killed 84 people. The construction of line 4 under the Seine was hailed as a great feat of engineering.

Fulgence Bienvenue died at the age of 84 in August 1936. He is buried at the Père Lachaise cemetery in eastern Paris. Preoccupied by the funeral of famous aviator Louis Blériot, which had taken place the previous day, journalists devoted only a few lines to Bienvenue’s death, and yet this man, like Baron Haussmann before him, revolutionised the everyday life of Parisians.