Besançon: the vibe
Videos from people who went, played right here, with what viewers said underneath. Not part of the score.
The verdict
Mixed · 62Commenters who know Besançon speak warmly of its compact beauty, citadel and efficient tram, but the content is mostly tourist vlogs and a few warnings about trains and summer service keep it middling for a remote-work stay.
- tram system
- architecture and citadel
- compact, walkable city
- river and scenery
- friendly local residents
- cheap public transit build
- infrequent tram in August
- summer roadworks
- misleading neighborhood guide footage
- thin info on daily life
- Besançon's tram is a smart, well-designed system for a small city
- Feels like a charming, underrated French town to visit
- Summer service gaps and roadworks are the main practical drawback
- Some neighborhood guides are inaccurate, so verify before relying on them
- Little firsthand content about remote work or long-term living
Read from 7 videos, 27 comments and 0 posts on 2026-11-07; the summary is written by a language model and can misread sarcasm.
Budget Light Rail Transit in Besançon, France
Félix on Rails · 21K views · 2024
What viewers said
“Short answer: yes. Long answer: absolutely yes. This little tram system looks amazing!”
♥ 109 likes
“Love it. The catenary polls actually look quite nice with their design. Beautiful town”
♥ 73 likes
“The trams of Besançon look like they've always been there. That's how well they were designed to fit the city!”
♥ 62 likes
“so here we have a public transit, as it should be... not oversized, not over fanzy, not one system (tram/bus/subway) and neglect of the others... and they got it cheap done, but not to cheap looking... should be an example for many cities o”
♥ 23 likes
“It's so inexpensive to build light rail in France. In the US a similar system would have been over a billion dollars.”
♥ 23 likes
“2 light rail lines in a city of 100k population is wild.”
♥ 31 likes
“For UK watchers at 3:57 Edinburgh slots in around 54 mill per km. If you want to see truly silly though look at the Wolverhampton extension- 50 million to get... 700m, on the surface, in an area not that densely built up.”
♥ 9 likes
“I love the Besançon Trams!! Super convenient and pretty fast. The only issue was that they tend to be infrequent especially in August. And the random "travaux d'été.." Coming from Japan it took a while to get used to”
♥ 17 likes
“Great Video and a great system. My only problem with it, which is a problem in too many systems, is the wrap on some of the trains blocking the windows with the dreaded dots, which I hate.”
♥ 39 likes
“The thing about French tram construction, unlike the English speaking world, is that once you complete a project, the workers and expertise can easily move to another one. Here in Australia they're treated as standalone projects, tendered o”
♥ 11 likes
Found with a YouTube search for the city and “digital nomad”, fetched 2026-11-07; titles, descriptions and comments belong to their authors and link to the originals.