We are travelling to paris for the world cup with our son in a wheelchair. we stay close to esplanade de la defence and are enquiring as to the best accessible way to get to stade de france saint denis.Thank youAlan McGrath
1 answer
Hi Alan,
I'd recommend taking buses instead of trains for ease of wheelchair accessibility.
This route from Esplanade de la Défense to Stade de France using 3 buses: bus 174, 274 and 255 is fully wheelchair accessible. The buses will be kneeling buses with extending ramp (usually rear door) so your son can roll-on/roll-off. There are ticket & pass validation machines at the rear entrance so it's fine to board at the rear doors.
There's another route suggested by Google maps using only two buses, bus 174 and 173, but unfortunately bus 173 is apparently not wheelchair accessible, so I would avoid this route. (See the Paris public transit authority's wheelchair accessibility page for a list of all accessible buses.)
If you're using tickets instead of multi-use passes like Navigo, be sure to purchase your tickets (the regular Ticket t+ / Paris Metro ticket will work for this trip) prior to beginning your trip, using either automated ticket machines or from a ticket window. Tickets purchased aboard a Paris bus are not valid for any transfers and cost 2.50€ each as opposed to 2.10€ from machines or ticket windows. You can purchase all of your tickets in a single transaction since Paris transit tickets don't expire prior to validation aboard a vehicle / inside a fare-paid area. So you can use your bought tickets at any time in the future.
Have a good trip,
Ben