How to park in Paris (bis)

 
 In Paris, there are three kinds of street parking.

Legal, illegal, and really illegal.

Above: legal parking spaces. Good luck finding one of those.

Parking on the wrong side of the street is illegal.

 

Parking on the sidewalk is illegal. But often toléré. You have to know where it's safe.

 

Parking touching another car is illegal, but ...

 

totally normal (unless the other driver is actually in the car you're bumping).

 

Double-parking is illegal, but everybody does it. There are parts of town where you completely expect it. This is on avenue Montaigne, part of the Golden Triangle of glamorous jet-set stores. (I once saw J.K. Rowling crossing the street here during the January sales.) Voituriers, or car valets, normally have to double-park at least some of their cars.

 People get desperate in Paris sometimes.

So parking in delivery spaces has just been allowed, at night and on weekends and holidays. 

What is really illegal? Only a few things. Parisians are better than you might expect about not parking in a handicap space. The other really illegal thing is to park in a crosswalk and Parisians avoid this if they possibly can. (Crosswalks are called passages cloutés, nailed passages, in France, because the old ones look like this:)

Unless they really need a parking spot.

On side of truck: "We are not here to complicate your life."

Comments

[Kate]

HELLO!
I'm writing to ask where you might have photographed the pedestrian crossing in the photo 2 above? The photo above the one with the van on it? I'm doing some research into old crossings with metal studs and I need to know where this crossing is!
Any help would be much appreciated as I don't live in Paris.
Many thanks!
Kate

[Sedulia]

Hi Kate,
I'm sorry, I don't remember where this is. Many street crossings in Paris still have these studs.