Living in Gorge de Loup, Lyon

Gorge de Loup sits in a valley on the right bank of the Saône, in the 9e Arrondissement, between the plateau of Champvert above it and the flat of Vaise to the north. It exists in its present form because of transport: the metro, the trains from the hills west of Lyon and the buses of the entire western suburb all converge on the same few hundred metres. That is the reason to live here, and almost everything else about the quarter follows from it.

What it is

A working valley rather than a picture. Offices, light industry and business parks along the valley floor, blocks of flats from the second half of the twentieth century on the slopes, a hypermarket, a scattering of older houses. There is a cluster of private business and engineering schools around the rue Sergent Michel Berthet and the rue Jean-Marie Leclair, which puts a few thousand students into the quarter during term. Parks are small but real, with green space at Montel to the north and pockets between the blocks. The Saône is a short walk east down the valley, with the quays and the riverside path along them.

Who lives here

A practical mix. Students at the private schools, who take rooms and shared flats and leave again after two or three years. Office workers from the business parks. Families in the post-war blocks, many of them long established, and a steady arrival of couples who wanted a metro at the door and could not pay Vieux Lyon prices. This is one of the better value parts of central-adjacent Lyon, and people move here for the arithmetic rather than the charm.

What it's like during the day

Busy at the interchange and unremarkable everywhere else. The station concourse and the bus stands are in constant movement, with people transferring from the western suburbs onto the metro. Away from that the streets are ordinary residential ones, with schools, small shops and traffic. A food market sets up once a week. There is little to look at, but everything works, and there is far less crowding than in the centre.

What it's like in the evening

Quiet. A few bars and restaurants near the station and along the main street, mostly serving students and people coming off the metro, and residential silence beyond them. There is no reason for anyone from another part of Lyon to come here at night, which keeps the streets calm. Anyone wanting an evening out takes the metro two stops east and is in Vieux Lyon or the Presqu'île in minutes.

Getting around

The whole point. Metro line D stops here and puts Vieux Lyon one stop away and Bellecour two, with no change, and continues right across the city to Grange Blanche and Vénissieux. The railway station on top of it takes the tram-train services of the Ouest lyonnais, which run between Saint-Paul in Vieux Lyon and the towns in the hills west of Lyon, so this is the door to that whole side of the region. On the surface it is the main bus station for western Lyon, with lines running out to Écully, Tassin, Sainte-Foy and beyond. Cycling into the centre along the Saône is flat and quick; cycling west is a climb, because the valley rises sharply. Driving in and out is easy by Lyon standards, and parking is far less of a fight than on the peninsula.

Eating and shopping

Everyday, and cheap. A large supermarket covers the weekly shop, which is unusual this close to the centre, and there are bakeries, small groceries and a weekly market. Restaurants are functional: pizza, kebab, Asian, a couple of brasseries near the station. For a proper market and a wider choice of shops, Vaise is a short bus ride or a twenty-minute walk north, and it has the bigger local centre of the two.

When NOT to pick it

Wrong if the look of the place matters to you, because the architecture is post-war and utilitarian and the valley is dominated by roads and railway. Wrong if you want to walk out of your door into a lively street; there is not one here. Wrong if you need quiet on all sides, since the interchange and the through roads generate noise and some buildings sit right on top of them. It is the right choice if you want the shortest possible metro ride into the centre for the lowest rent, if you study at one of the schools here, or if you commute out to the western suburbs and want to do it without a car. If you want the same corner of the city with more life and a proper high street, look north to Vaise; if you want green and quiet instead of connections, look up the hill to Champvert or Point du Jour.