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GLANCE

Glance around France: Ouigo expands low-cost train routes and bedbugs invade Paris cinema

Thursday's round-up of stories from around France includes new Ouigo routes to launch from Paris in December, bedbugs in a Paris cinema and an interesting story about France's mayors.

Glance around France: Ouigo expands low-cost train routes and bedbugs invade Paris cinema
Photo: AFP
Ouigo to expand train service from Paris to new destinations in France
 
From December 9th Ouigo will start running TGV trains from Paris Gare de Lyon, expanding it’s network to six new towns in the south of France: Nice, Cannes, Antibes, Toulon, Saint-Raphaël et les Arcs-Draguignan.
 
Although tickets for this line are still low-cost, travellers will have to pay a slightly higher fare to depart from the station in central Paris.
 
Tickets from Gare de Lyon to Marseille will start at €19, whereas tickets from Marne la Vallée, on the outskirts of Paris, to Marseille will be available for around €10.
 
On the same date, Ouigo is also changing the location of its platforms in Paris’ Gare Montparnasse. The move from hall 3 (gare Vaugirard) to hall 2 (Pasteur) will make the service more accessible from the metro.
 

 
 
Half of French mayors don't plan to stand for re-election in 2020
 
It seems that huge numbers of France's mayors have just about had enough. 
 
One mayor in two in France says they don't want to run for the position again, according to a new poll by the Centre for Political Research at Sciences Po (Cevipof) and the Association of Mayors (AMF). 
 
This is particularly true of mayors in small towns reveals the poll which comes just a few days before France's big Mayor's Congress on November 19th-22nd. 
 
More than a third of mayors cited the lack of financial means to properly carry out their role as the reason for wanting to give up their role while 36 percent say they have “more and more difficulties in meeting the demands of their constituents”. 
 
This is a stark contrast to the mayoral elections in 2014 when 60 percent of the outgoing mayors not only stood for re-election but won. 
 
“This kind of rejuvenation would certainly inject some vitality into local democracy, but it also highlights a certain crisis of vocation,” said the authors of the report.
 
 

 
 
Bedbugs found in Paris cinema
 
There might be a few Paris cinema-goers out there who feel itchy reading this. 
 
The presence of bedbugs has been confirmed in an MK2 cinema in Paris, following complaints from multiple cinema-goers on social media.
 
Although bedbugs are not dangerous they do bite humans to feed on their blood, resulting in itchy welt-like bite marks.
 
They are also notoriously difficult to get rid of.
 
The cinema, at Quai de Loire in Paris’ 19tharrondissement, has announced it will disinfect the infested auditorium today.
 

 
 
Road deaths down by 13.8% percent in mainland France
 
Road deaths in France for October 2018 are down by 13.8 percent compared to the same month in 2017, according to national road safety organisation Sécurité Routière.
 
There were 319 deaths on the road in October 2017 and 275 in October 2018.
 
The figures, taken from France's national road safety body (ONISR), also show falls in road deaths in July (-5.5%) and August (-15.5%) of this year, although September saw a rise of 8,8% compared to last year.
 
Speed limits on local roads (or route secondaires) were reduced from 90 to 80km/hour throughout France in July with the aim of reducing deaths and injuries. 
 

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WEATHER

IN PICTURES: French town hit by freak June hailstorm

A French town has been hit by a freak hailstorm that left locals clearing drifts of ice in the streets with shovels and snow ploughs.

IN PICTURES: French town hit by freak June hailstorm
Photo: Sapeurs-pompiers des Vosges

The hail struck the town of Plombières-les-Bains in the Vosges mountains on Tuesday morning.

Romain Munier, head of communications for the local emergency services, told French media: “There were up to 60 centimetres of accumulated hail” while in the wider area, “up to 10 millimetres of water accumulated in six minutes”.

https://twitter.com/timbaland57/status/1409881345741012994

Locals were pictured clearing the street of ice with shovels and snow ploughs after the storm passed and the fire and rescue crews for the Vosges area said they had received 56 callouts in total.

Large areas of France are on weather alert for storms until Thursday, as a ‘cold drop’ passes over the country leading to extremely unsettled weather.

In most areas, however, the storms will be confined to heavy rain and thunder.

In neighbouring Switzerland, the Swiss news agency ATS reported giant hailstones up to seven centimetres wide in the canton of Lucerne.

In the canton of Fribourg, the police and fire brigade were called 300 times, including to rescue a class of 16 children and two adults caught in the hail.

Six of the children and one adult were taken to hospital.

At least five people were injured in the German-speaking Swiss cantons, including a cyclist who suffered head injuries from hailstones, according to ATS, whilst in Germany severe flooding has hit parts of the country including Stuttgart.

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