PalenQ

I recently spent a week in Paris, a city i have visited many times before. Here are some of my observations and opinions of some things that stood out:

TOILETTE A GRATUIT
Yep i couldn't believe it when i saw the first of those fancy public toilets the French seem to have invented and even marketed abroad with the words "a gratuit" on it - free public toilet. I thought it must be an anomaly but there was another and another and all in town were free.
That these fancy toilets that claim to automatically clean each other after use were free boggled my mind and to me were much overdue so that the city's army of homeless folks or street 'wine bags' or clochards can relieve themselves in them rather than on the streets as is the tradition.
I did indeed notice that Paris seemed cleaner than i've ever seen it. Not only were the fleet of sidewalk cleaning machines out in force and workers clad in green work uniforms with those crude looking plastic brooms directing refuse into the gutters where gushing water swept them to who knows where, but in another STUNNING development:

Dog owners were actually picking up their dogs' wastes with plastic bags..this really blew me away as Parisian streets have for long required pedestrians to look down so as to not step in doggie doo. Some wag once even calculated that a pieton not looking down would step in dog doo once every several hundred steps or some such ridiculous figure.
Apparently authorities are cracking down on dog owners who are now required to pick up after their pooches. Stiff fines i heard were the reason for this sudden and rather to me un-French compliance.

TBC

crefloors

Saw a lovely lady out walking her chien early one morning last November, and she had her trusty plastic baggy with her.

Robespierre

Thanks for bringing us the straight poop.

lmlweb

I noticed this when I was in September. Alas, on the very last day, in the last hour of Paris, I did step on a doodoo on Blvd St-Germaine! Ah, c'est la vie!

PalenQ

Well there does indeed seem to be a greening of Paris happening and let's hope it continues.

THE TGB
I had briefly looked at the fairly new Bibliotheque Nationale Francois Mitterand a few years back (not sure i got the French wording right for the sprawling Mitterand National Library which opened several years ago in the vicinity of Austerlitz train station).
The library is striking to view from afar as surrounding a deep sunken plaza with a forest of trees are four huge open-book like towers on each of the four corners...so it looks like four huge open books...the towers host offices and the library i guess.

Anyway i ventured over to it after arriving in Austerlitz, my usual portal to Paris for my commute from Les Aubrais about an hour south of Paris. Not sure what there was to see there, i climbed up the series of steps that surrounds it on all sides only to them plunge farther back down on an escaltor into the library bowels.
At ground zero i found the Espace Publique or exposition area where they had a fine display of public posters from Parisian history...the development of the ubiquitous Paris posters of protests or entertainment, etc. So i guess there are usually special exhibitions here that seem to be free and open to all.
Besides that there's not much to see but marvel at the unique structure as most of the library is used for research purposes.
The area around the library has been developed with offices of many large corporations and is a thoroughly modern London-like development quite unusual for central Paris but pleasant enough.
A spanking new spiffy RER C rapid transit stop is now open near the library.
The new library has been dubbed the 'TGB' or Tres Grande Bibliotheque...a take on the TGV Train a Grande Vitesse or high-speed train i guess...TGB meaning Very Big Library
And the TGB was the only museum, public building, etc. besides train stations that i went in where there weren't airport-like security controls.

PalenQ

back to dog doo...a press report says that trhere is a $200 fine for not picking up after dogs and it's being enforced - thus the unbelievable a few years ago spector of Parisians with plastic bag in hand.

another great change i observed was the very first day of no smoking inside public places

everyone was gaggled outside doors puffing away - does not extend to cafes until one year from Feb 1, when this law took effect. Also does not apply to train station platforms as i guess these are not enclosed.

but the attitude of folks i talked to were overwhelmingly in favor of the no-smoking in public and workplaces. Another big surprise to me.

kerouac

Yes, there are a number of myths about the French which have expired.

However, there is a cinema advertising campaign for a Paris tabloid called "Le Parisien" (The Parisian, for the linguistically challenged).

In one ad, a businessman is returning home to his chic building. He gets out of the elevator and sniffs suspiciously. Yes, there it is: dog crap all over his shoe. He walks to the doormat and, incredibly, vigorously wipes off all of the brown stuff right in front of the door. Once he has finished, he walks to the OPPOSITE door on the landing and goes home.
The tagline is: "The Parisian. It's better when it's a newspaper."

There are 3 or 4 other ads in the same vein, but that's the most effective one.

kerouac

p.s. The automatic toilets in Paris became free of charge in February 2006.

Don't expect them to be free in other cities.

DaveBrad

GROAN! Robespierre, you just HAD to say it, didn't you?

Robespierre

Well, we want to have the scoop, don't we?

Art_Vandelay

PalenQ, congratulations on discovering the BNF and its neighborhood, since most of my American friends sneer at this - too modern for their conception of an old world capital - architectural marvel. I gathered you haven't entered the building itself (as I do on a regular basis) since, yes, you have to go to the usual "airport like security" of opening your bags, etc. Nothing horrendous though.

You are a bit unfair when you say there isn't much to see. The Simone de Beauvoir footbridge is Paris's 14th or something and latest bridge and is a stunning double helicoidal structure. At its feet, a kind of replacement for the late Piscine Deligny, a swimming pool floating on the Seine, that doubles with a sun deck come summer. Its name? Josephine Baker. The MK2 Bibliothèque is arguably the best Paris movie multiplex, featuring a dozen arty and mainstream movies to be seen in huge comfy seats. It doesn't show yet, but the area between the library and the périphérique is about to host many universities, some law courts, etc.
And finally, a precision about the name of the library itself: the full name is Bibliothèque nationale de France François Mitterrand. It is actually the main site of the BNF, but this entity also comprises the old Bibliothèque nationale rue de Richelieu (Palais-Royal), and I think a smaller library devoted to stage entertainment located within the Opéra Garnier.

sunnyeve17

going on about the toilets, definitely one of the cleanest in europe. take advantage because the other places can be very gross!