Who hasn’t admired the sunset over Montmartre sitting behind the window of a line 2 metro? But who has ever wondered about cleaning these windows? Fortunately for the few who wondered, 20 minutes has the answer. And this answer, hidden in the bowels of the capital, will be visible on the occasion of the European Heritage Days *, Saturday.
It is an automatic washing machine, like for cars but larger, installed in a portion of the RATP tunnel. It is accessed by an old gallery that smells of humidity from a platform at Porte de Vincennes station. After a few meters, you come to a railway tunnel “which dates from 1900”, specifies Bruno Le Morvan, responsible for the management of RATP washing machines and who acts as a guide. On the left, the tunnel leads to the line 2 garage and then to the Nation station.
More hand-washed oars
On the right, not far from there, in a bend, appears the famous washing machine. “This is the last one we have installed, it has been working since March 2022, specifies the manager. Our first machine was installed in 1979 in Châtillon for line 13.” Today ten metro lines and four RER lines have been equipped with a washer. For the rest, it’s water jet and elbow grease. And each metro has the right to a big hand wash once a month, to clean the interstices for example.
“To avoid having an impact on the punctuality of the trains, it is necessary to coordinate the washings which are done at off-peak hours”, explains Bruno Le Morvan. Line 2 has 45 75m trains and each train must be showered at least once a week, which gives, according to our calculations, around ten trains to be washed per working day.
And it is Michel, 27 years in the box, who sticks to it. “Per line, there are two drivers who are in charge of washing, but other drivers are trained to ensure replacements, he explains. And for the washing part, we do that from 9:45 a.m. to 1 p.m. Because Michel also takes care of driving the trains for maintenance.
A minute and a half of happiness
And driving in wash requires a certain skill since the train must not go more than 3 km / h. “In a service station, it’s a gantry that moves around the car at the speed of one km/h, details Bruno Le Morvan. But here, it is the train that moves and as it is complicated to drive at less than 3 km/h, we have multiplied by three the number of brush rollers. » And as it is a state-of-the-art machine, the adjustment of the washing jets is done by laser, which is practical to avoid drowning the air conditioning units located on the roof of the trains.
Washing takes 1 minute 30 minutes, including rinsing, and consumes 150 liters of water per wagon, knowing that a train has 5 wagons, ie 750 liters in total. “Over 20 years, we have halved our water consumption and above all, per wagon, it’s 50 liters less than for washing a car”, compares Bruno Le Morvan. Washing and rinsing water, loaded with detergents, is also collected by the RATP to be reprocessed before being poured back into the Seine.
And as a household tip, to avoid limescale marks on the windows, the transporter uses softened water and water-repellent products which accelerate the fall of the water. What should not be done to have presentable metros.
* Registration for the visit Tuesday, September 13 from noon this way