Marseille Public Transport

"Marseille Transport

An extensive network of motorways connects Marseille to the north and west (A7), Aix-en-Provence in the north (A51), Toulon (A50) and the French Riviera (A8) to the east.

Gare de Marseille Saint-Charles is Marseille's main railway station. It operates direct regional services to cities such as Toulon, Avignon, Nice, Montpellier, Toulouse, Bordeaux, Nantes... The northerly single track line to Briancon via Aix-en-Provence is currently partially closed during modernisation. Gare Saint-Charles is also one of the main terminal stations for the TGV in the south of France making Marseille reachable in three hours from Paris (a distance of over 750 km) and just over one and a half hours from Lyon. There are also direct TGV lines to Lille, Brussels, Nantes, Genève and Strasbourg.

There is a long distance bus station, still under construction, adjacent to Gare Saint-Charles with destinations mostly in the Bouches-du-Rhône. Temporarily buses to Aix-en-Provence depart from the nearby Porte d'Aix. Other buses to Cassis, La Ciotat and Aubagne depart from Castellane.

Marseille has a large ferry terminal, the Gare Maritime, with services to Corsica, Sardinia, Algeria and Tunisia. A ferry service on a quite different scale operates between the two opposite quays of the Old Port.

Marseille itself is connected by the metro train system operated by the Régie des transports de Marseille (RTM). It consists of 2 lines represented by red and blue. Line 1 (blue) between Castellane and La Rose opened in 1977 and Line 2 (red) between Sainte-Marguerite/Dromel and Bougainville opened between 1984 and 1987. An extension to Line 1 from Castellane to La Timone was completed in 1992. The Metro system operates on a turnstile system, with tickets purchased at the nearby adjacent automated booths. Both lines of the Metro intersect at Gare Saint-Charles and Castellane.

An extensive bus network serves the city and suburbs of Marseille. The first phase of a new tramway, going eastwards from the port towards St Barnabé, was opened in July 2007.

As in many other French cities, a short-term bicycle hire scheme nicknamed "le vélo", free for trips of less than half an hour, has recently been put in place by the town council."

This articol is release from GNU Free Documentation License. It use material from Wikipedia voices: "Marseille".