RER Crush

(10/27/22) I thought I knew crowded. I had ridden the MARC train and the Washington, D.C. Metro on my Baltimore-D.C. commute for years, but have never experienced crowded like this. Everything goes off without a hitch at Charles de Gaulle Airport. Passport control has been passed and baggage has been retrieved. We traverse what feels like the entire length of Airport Terminal 2, headed for the RER B. No problem, we’re not in a hurry. So why do I feel like we’re racing? Very quickly, I’m damp with sweat and slightly out of breath. The adrenaline rush continues. We locate a ticketing kiosk where we refill our Pass Navigo cards, the weekly (or monthly) pass that allows riders to travel the extent of the entire RER Network from Versailles to Disneyland Paris.

The RER (Réseau Express Régional, or Regional Express Network) is a commuter rail network that serves all of the Île de France (i.e., Paris and its environs); Line B is a direct link between Charles de Gaulle Airport and the Paris city center. We’ve ridden the RER B to and from the airport several times on prior trips with no problem. It’s always been a cheap and easy way into the city. D’habitude, c’est du gâteau. But, not today. A lightbulb goes on inside my head. Merde! It’s morning rush hour in Paris!

When we board at Charles de Gaulle, which happens to be the end of the line, the car is understandably empty. Three stops into our hour-long ride, things are getting snug. As we pull into each subsequent station, I see a mob of people waiting to board. Each time I declare aloud, as if to make it so, “This is it – we can’t take any more!” Surely, they can see that and they’ll wait for the next train. But each time, they press in, undeterred. I can only think this is a normal morning commute for them. Quel horreur! Bob and I wheel our suitcases around so that they are now wedged between our bodies and the short wall that separates the seating area from the standing area. We lean forward, trying to put some distance between our faces and the mostly unmasked passengers. I roll my eyes in Bob’s direction and mumble, if there was ever a time when we needed our COVID vaccines to do their job, now would be the time.

Finally, we pull into the large hub station Châtelet Les Halles, doors open and we practically spill out onto the platform, thoroughly relieved to be leaving that crush behind. We make our connection to Métro Line 1 and prepare for the two easy stops to our destination: St. Paul, a pleasant, two-block walk from the apartment.

(By Chabe01 - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=119872068)