La Petite Ceinture

The La Petite Ceinture is a double track of rusted steel rails that loops around Paris in a sunken trench, reclaimed by wild grasses, ivy, and thickets of buddleia. Built in the mid-nineteenth century to connect the city’s major railway terminals, the line once moved steam engines and passengers through the heart of the capital. By the nineteen thirties, the rise of the Metro and the bus system pushed the trains into obsolescence, leaving these tracks to silence, graffiti, and creeping ivy.