Each edition grades its towns against each other only.
Photo: Marie-Lan Nguyen · CC BY 4.0Footpaths add up to 54 km across Bruyères-le-Châtel (4.2 km per km²). No protected area reaches Bruyères-le-Châtel; the nearest, Haute Vallée de Chevreuse Regional Nature Park, is 0.8 km from the town center. Waymarked hiking routes add up to 10 km in Bruyères-le-Châtel. France has no Outdoors Grade yet: these are the figures, each beside the compared towns’ median.
Throughout this page, the Essonne median and the France median are the median of compared communes (those with an overall grade), each figure its own median.
Read from the data: what stands out first, good and less good.
What sets Bruyères-le-Châtel apart: its woods, then its footpaths.
Each figure against the 3,798 compared French towns (communes with an overall grade): the marked bar is the town’s, the line the median. Described, not graded.
Percentiles among compared French towns; ties count half.
The 40 compared French towns nearest in population (3,752 to 3,825 residents), by km of footpath per km². Hover for each one’s protected land and woods; click for its page.
From Barby (6.7 km per km²) to Courtenay (0 km per km²).
| Town | Paths (km/km²) | Woodland | Protected | Coast | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Barby Savoie | 6.7 | 35% | 39% | 232 km |
| 2 | Argonay Haute-Savoie | 5.1 | 35% | 0% | 263 km |
| 3 | Soorts-Hossegor Landes | 4.9 | 30% | 0% | On it |
| 4 | Bruyères-le-Châtel Essonne | 4.2 | 64% | 0.1% | 163 km |
| 5 | Clouange Moselle | 3.9 | 50% | 0% | 312 km |
| 6 | Bouliac Gironde | 2.6 | 13% | 4.7% | 22 km |
| 7 | Châteauneuf-Grasse Alpes-Maritimes | 2.6 | 12% | 0% | 13 km |
| 8 | Trébeurden Côtes-d'Armor | 2.5 | 25% | 24% | On it |
| 9 | Montmerle-sur-Saône Ain | 2.4 | 13% | 20% | 286 km |
| 10 | Grand-Aigueblanche Savoie | 2.4 | 63% | 0.1% | 208 km |
| 11 | Sospel Alpes-Maritimes | 2 | 57% | 100% | 12 km |
| 12 | Saint-Symphorien-sur-Coise Rhône | 1.9 | 1.9% | 0% | 232 km |
| 13 | Saint-Mihiel Meuse | 1.8 | 66% | 7.4% | 314 km |
| 14 | Callian Var | 1.7 | 59% | 10% | 19 km |
| 15 | Charlieu Loire | 1.7 | 5.4% | 0% | 289 km |
| 16 | Malville Loire-Atlantique | 1.7 | 17% | 1.9% | 24 km |
| 17 | Saint-Étienne-lès-Remiremont Vosges | 1.6 | 73% | 22% | 432 km |
| 18 | La Bazoge Sarthe | 1.6 | 25% | 0% | 126 km |
| 19 | Alénya Pyrénées-Orientales | 1.5 | 0.1% | 5.7% | 4.4 km |
| 20 | Torreilles Pyrénées-Orientales | 1.5 | 0.4% | 20% | On it |
| 21 | Ploubezre Côtes-d'Armor | 1.3 | 17% | 6.5% | 3.3 km |
| 22 | Saint-Ay Loiret | 1.3 | 6.3% | 10% | 203 km |
| 23 | Échillais Charente-Maritime | 1.2 | 9% | 8.5% | On it |
| 24 | Saint-Clair-du-Rhône Isère | 1.2 | 19% | 0.2% | 216 km |
| 25 | Saint-Martin-la-Plaine Loire | 0.9 | 11% | 0% | 224 km |
| 26 | Brantôme en Périgord Dordogne | 0.8 | 48% | 20% | 104 km |
| 27 | Bapaume Pas-de-Calais | 0.8 | 0.9% | 0% | 84 km |
| 28 | Pujols Lot-et-Garonne | 0.8 | 12% | 0% | 123 km |
| 29 | Bouxwiller Bas-Rhin | 0.7 | 11% | 0.3% | 418 km |
| 30 | Bénesse-Maremne Landes | 0.7 | 42% | 0.1% | 6.6 km |
| 31 | Lavernose-Lacasse Haute-Garonne | 0.7 | 2.6% | 0% | 153 km |
| 32 | Fougerolles-Saint-Valbert Haute-Saône | 0.7 | 36% | 100% | 429 km |
| 33 | Beaumont-de-Lomagne Tarn-et-Garonne | 0.6 | 6.5% | 0% | 177 km |
| 34 | Vouziers Ardennes | 0.5 | 14% | 18% | 234 km |
| 35 | Puiseux-en-France Val-d'Oise | 0.4 | 2.2% | 0% | 138 km |
| 36 | Chauconin-Neufmontiers Seine-et-Marne | 0.3 | 4.2% | 0% | 158 km |
| 37 | Plémet Côtes-d'Armor | 0.3 | 10% | 0% | 35 km |
| 38 | Nazelles-Négron Indre-et-Loire | 0.3 | 17% | 4.5% | 202 km |
| 39 | Terres-de-Haute-Charente Charente | 0.3 | 23% | 0% | 116 km |
| 40 | Val de Virvée Gironde | 0.1 | 12% | 0% | 16 km |
| 41 | Courtenay Loiret | 0 | 20% | 0% | 253 km |
Tap a number to zoom to a park or wood. Tap a layer to hide it. The dashed line is the commune’s boundary.
Named parks, gardens and woods in the commune or within 400 m, the biggest and best-pathed first: Forêt départementale de la Roche Turpin leads, at 968 ha. Directions go to a point inside.
Source: © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL): named parks, gardens and woods; sizes are the whole site.
The protected areas reaching the commune, and the nearest: national parks, regional nature parks, nature reserves and Natura 2000 sites.
Designations overlap (a regional park can hold a Natura 2000 site), so the rows don’t add up; the first counts each piece of land once.
A regional nature park is a charter between communes to look after a landscape: farming, building and hunting go on inside it.
Source: INPN / PatriNat, protected areas July 2026, Natura 2000 December 2024; shares of IGN’s commune boundary.
Paths, bridleways, steps and tracks open on foot, and waymarked hiking routes, mapped on OpenStreetMap inside the commune; woods are mapped forest and woodland, private woods included.
That is more than in 86% of compared French towns for footpaths per km², and for woodland more than in 97% of compared French towns. Hiking routes often follow paths and lanes already counted, so the two lengths overlap: don’t add them. Every home in Bruyères-le-Châtel is within 800 m of a mapped park or wood, as in most French towns.
GR 655ET passes within 2 km of Bruyères-le-Châtel.
Source: © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL), extracts of October 25, 2026 (Geofabrik).
Météo-France’s 1991–2020 normals at Fontenay-Les-B., 2.7 km away, and the daylight at the town’s latitude. Outlined months have long days, highs of 15 to 30 °C and little rain for the place.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Daylight (h) | 8.7 | 10.1 | 11.7 | 13.6 | 15.2 | 16.1 | 15.7 | 14.3 | 12.5 | 10.7 | 9.1 | 8.3 |
| High (°C) | 7 | 9 | 13 | 16 | 20 | 24 | 26 | 26 | 22 | 17 | 11 | 8 |
| Rain (mm) | 54 | 49 | 50 | 48 | 69 | 58 | 61 | 63 | 51 | 61 | 61 | 71 |
April is the driest month (48 mm) and July the warmest (highs of 26 °C). 71 mm of rain falls in December, the wettest month. Frost comes on about 53 nights a year. The climate in Bruyères-le-Châtel →
The nearest towns of 2,500 or more, colored by the share of their land in protected areas.
| Town | Protected | Woodland | Paths (km/km²) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Bruyères-le-Châtel | 0.1% | 64% | 4.2 |
| Breuillet 9,157 · 2.4 km | 0% | 33% | 2.8 |
| Ollainville 5,455 · 2.8 km | 0% | 37% | 1.7 |
| Égly 7,166 · 3.5 km | 0% | 13% | 3.9 |
| Arpajon 11,698 · 4.3 km | 0% | 2.4% | 3.3 |
| Boissy-sous-Saint-Yon 3,882 · 4.6 km | 0% | 28% | 1.1 |
| La Norville 4,268 · 5.4 km | 0% | 4% | 2.2 |
No. The nearest protected area is Haute Vallée de Chevreuse Regional Nature Park, 0.8 km from the town center.
OpenStreetMap maps 54 km of footpaths and tracks open on foot in the commune, 4.2 km per km² (the median compared town: 1.7 km per km²); 10 km of waymarked hiking routes cross it.
64% of the commune is mapped woodland, private woods included; the median compared French town has 13%.
No: the coast is 163 km from the town center, as the crow flies.
April and June to September: long days, mild highs and little rain, from Météo-France’s 1991–2020 normals at the nearest suitable station.
TownRatings grades the outdoors in the U.S. and the UK; the French figures are new and not graded yet. This page sets each one beside the median compared French town instead.
Sources: INPN / PatriNat (protected areas 2026, Natura 2000 2024) · © OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL (paths, hiking routes, woods, coast, gardens) · INSEE, Filosofi 2021 200 m grid (residents) · IGN Admin Express (boundaries) · Météo-France normals 1991–2020 · Medians and percentiles: TownRatings, over compared French towns, updated November 4, 2026. Under the Licence Ouverte / Open Licence 2.0 (Etalab).
Contains public sector information under the Licence Ouverte / Open Licence 2.0 (Etalab): INSEE, DGFiP, the Interior Ministry’s statistics service (SSMSI), the Ministry of Education (DEPP), the Health Ministry’s statistics service (DREES) and the Housing Ministry (Carte des loyers). Commune boundaries: IGN Admin Express.