The Paris Metro station seen above, accessed by two narrow staircases, is called Boulogne Jean Jaures after the main street outside the modest entrance. It is close to the southern extremity of the famous Bois de Boulogne, a vast open space filling a good part of a sharp "hook" in the river Seine. 
Which reminds fbb of a song!
As I walk into the Gare de Boulogne
With an independent air
You can hear them all declare
"He seems very well aware."
You can hear them sigh and wish to die,
You can see them look with wondrous eye
At the man who understands the Paris Metro.
Maybe, maybe not!
Metro line 10 (M10) has a complicated history with major changes made, almost overnight (!), in 1937. It's a bit too esoteric for a brief blog, but a couple of maps will serve to summarise.
In very simple terms, the underperforming M10 (ORANGE) was linked to the old M8 (LILAC) to the southwest and lost another bit to the former M14 (PURPLE) which subsequently crossed the Seine and joined with the M13 and lost its historic number. A new chunk of M8 produced (more or less) the Metro map of today.
Try to stay awake and keep up!
Note the the M10 (ex M8) is shown as ending in a loop at Porte d'Auteuil.
Mirabeau station, the last in the anti-clockwise loop) is an oddity. It only has an eastbound platform as trains using the loop rise up on a ramp.
This was not too much of a problem when the loop was in operation, but baffles many an unwary Metro rider today!
The line was subsequently extended by two stops but still has a selection of "one direction" (a good name for a popular entertainment music group?) stations. 
Beware Metro maps! Occasionally Mirabeau is shown wrongly as above.
You still can't travel east from Mirabeau!
The later terminus at Porte de Saint Cloud is also an oddity. It has no storage sidings beyond the platforms unlike all other Metro lines. It has buffer stops in a short stub! The builders did not want the expense of a second tunnel under the "hook" of the Seine!
But our interest in Metro extensions takes us to the other end of the line, currently terminating at Gare d'Austerlitz.
The Seine runs roughly north-south at this point and you can see lots of railway "stuff" a little inland from the river. The tracks carry one of the RER line C branches.
Between rail and water is lots of redundant industrial land due for development as a ZAC - several ZACs in fact.
And so it really, really needs a Metro.
Phase one is to Ivry Gambetta (roundabout bottom right in aerial view below) where ...
... you can see new stuff upper left and "brown land" (literally!) to the right. The second phase to Les Ardoines comes later. There is, as yet, nothing to see because the line is an aspiration but a firm aspiration with station locations already pencilled in.
Campaigners have branded it "La Grande 10" to emphasise its importance and its necessity.
Parisians thus await final details with guarded excitement; and with a well organised PR campaign.
Voilà des territoires méconnaissables, dynamiques et novateurs, nouveaux bassins de vie, d’emplois et de logements qui sortent de terre.
Les étude préalables du prolongement de la ligne n°10 depuis la Gare d’Austerlitz vers Ivry puis Vitry envisagent des interconnexions avec la ligne 15 du Grand-Paris Express, les lignes de métro n°6 (Chevaleret), n°14 (Bibliothèque F.M.) et la ligne de tram T3a (Avenue de France) et démontrent son intérêt évident sur les plans économique, social et environnemental.
Si le projet est engagé depuis de longues années, il est aujourd’hui au point mort et le but de notre association est de le relancer afin de limiter les retards qui en découleront.
i.e. It's all going too slowly and our campaign is to get it going properly and "plus vite, zut alors"!
Au plus vite, il faut poursuivre les études afin de fixer le tracé définitif et lancer les concertations publiques.
So, to coin a phrase, "GET LA GRANDE 10 DONE!"
Plus d’informations sur le projet, sur l’association, la pétition, la newsletter, …
fbb struggles with the English for "la newsletter"!
OK, that's FOUR of the SIX metro extensions covered - two to go; plus TWO totally new lines in build at the moment with more to follow!
(When fbb referred on ONE new line in a previous blog he was, as is often the case, not fully "with it". Two brand new lines are, indeed, under construction.)
How many new railway lines, trams or even bus services are on the cards for the next few years in London?
THAT IS "LA DIFFERENCE"!
Next Vive La Difference blog : Tuesday 5th April
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