Tags
Arc de Triomphe, Belleville, Butte-aux-Cailles, Ménilmontant, Montagne Sainte-Geneviève, Montmartre, Montparnasse, Panthéon, Paris, seven hills of Paris, topography of Paris, Vélib, Vélib' Plus
You always hear about the seven hills of Rome but what about the seven hills of Paris? This reports on my scientific study of the Parisian hills, based on the Vélib’ bicycle sharing system. High-elevation Vélib’ stations are designated with a “+” sign, indicating that you will get a credit if you ride a bicycle up there from a lower-elevation station. This is important because the natural tendancy is to coast down but not struggle back up. The Vélib’ iOS app shows the location of all stations, et voila !
Montmartre: 130 m (425 ft), north. Notice all the empty “+” stations. Maybe they need a “++” category for this steep hill.
Belleville: 128 m (420 ft), northeast. (Overlaps with Ménilmontant.)
Ménilmontant: 108 m (354 ft), east. (Overlaps with Belleville.)
Montagne Sainte-Geneviève: 61 m (200 ft), south, around the Panthéon.
Butte-aux-Cailles: 62 m (203 ft), south, near Place d’Italie.
Montparnasse: 66 m (217 ft), southwest.
The Arc de Triomphe is on a little hill, though I couldn’t find its name; west.
There are, of course, less rigorously scientific ways of categorizing the Paris hills, such as this Wikipedia item: Topography of Paris.
