I read somewhere that u can ride in the metro/RER in paris for free if you have an interrail pass.
Is this true?
Do you get any kind of discount at all?
Thanks and bye

in Paris you can use the suburban trains.
but you can not use the metro (RATP).

Hi, the Paris Metro is one of the cheapest in the world. A single journey is, I think, 1 Euro 20 centimes. That will get you right across the city. By comparison a single journey on the London Underground costs 4 GBP!

Have a great one.

There are day-tickets. There is a ticket for tourists and one only for people from paris. The price is arround 6 and 9 € I think. But if you tell the seller how sweet she is you would get the cheeper paris-ticket (own exp)

blueyo wrote:There are day-tickets. There is a ticket for tourists and one only for people from paris.

Don't buy the "Paris Visite" ticket, which is very expensive and only bought by foreign people who have no idea of prices.

"Mobilis" ticket is cheaper, and not reserved for Paris people. You just have to choose the pricing areas depending of where you want to travel.

RER is managed by both RATP and SNCF. RATP manages line A east of Nanterre Préfecture and line B south of Paris Nord. You may have free travel on SNCF RER and more generally on the "Transilien" network around Paris (I don't know) but not of RATP sections (I'm positive about that).

Does anybody know if travelling by Transilien trains (from the centre of Paris to Versailles for example) is free with an interrail pass? I think it is so but I would like to be sure... Thanks.

It should be definiteley valid on the SNCF Transilien network. As for the RER lines I don't think it's valid (even on those lines operated by SNCF). However, I've written a mail to check, hoping to get an answer soon.

Well, I wrote an email to SNCF and this is what they responded:

Bonjour Monsieur,

J'ai bien pris connaissance de votre message.

La carte Interrail ne vous permet pas de circuler sur le réseau transilien.

Sincères salutations.
B. SAIU

Meaning IR is not valiable neither on RER nor Transilien, sorry.

Really kind of you to write an email and all, thanks. But isn't it weird that it's not valid.. after all it is a national railroad? (I know you can't do anything about it, I'm just wondering.) I think I will try to get a free or discounted ticket anyway. Maybe the staff at the station will have mercy on me

It's really weird since Transilien is fully operated by SNCF, like you've said. You really should just try and check locally.
However I've just written another mail to ask why it isn't valid since it's valid on all other TER networks in France. Really corious on their response.

Sur le réseau Transilien la SNCF n'est qu'exploitant, le décideur est le STIF (Syndicat des Transports en Ile de France).

Meaning that the SNCF only runs the network on behalf of the STIF. And STIF decides that InterRail tickets aren't valid.

The reason that the STIF has declared InterRail invalid, may very well be a very practical one (this is my guess, I have no official information on the topic): many (but not all) stations on the Transilien network have restricted access, using entrance gates - similar to many metro systems in the world. That means you can't get on the platform if you can't open the gates. And trying to stick an InterRail pass in the 3cm slot of the machine is not really going to work...

But as Nico noted, Mobilis is a relatively cheap option (which will fit into the 3cm slot ). The maximum price, for zones 1 to 6 - which you will only need if you're going to visit distant sights such as Fontainebleau or the Brie region - is € 17,30 in 2010. Disneyland is in zone 5 (€ 13,65), Versailles in zone 4 (€ 10,15), and if you're just visiting the centre of Paris (zones 1 and 2), it comes as cheap as € 6,10. Note, however, that Mobilis is not valid to and from the airports... a clever way of making sure that the American and Japanese tourists buy Paris Visite instead . So if you are travelling to and from CDG or Orly, Mobilis is not the ticket for you.