Capital redevelopment – Paris removes 70,000 parking spaces – News

The mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, is planning a radical reorganization of the French capital. Over the next six years, 70,000 parking spaces are expected to disappear from the city – there should be more green spaces and cycle paths. But this is only the beginning, as the ARD correspondent in Paris, Marcel Wagner, knows.

Marcel Wagner

Correspondent for France, ARD

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Marcel Wagner is the head of the ARD radio studio and head of the Südwestrundfunks (SWR) studio in Paris., The link opens in a new window

SRF News: What should Paris look like according to Mayor Hidalgo’s vision?

Marcel Wagner: Significantly greener and car-free today.

The long-term goal of Hidalgo is the “city of 15 minutes”: residents should be able to get everything they need to live in 15 minutes. How does it work?

In order to reach the doctor, the supermarket, all the administrative ones, but also schools and kindergartens within 15 minutes, many more cycle paths are needed, but also more green areas on which pedestrians can move faster and with greater determination. It will all take years. Now the mayor is hammering the stakes for these plans.

The Parisian suburbs are poorly connected to the center of Paris, tens of thousands of people commute to their workplace in the city center every day, sometimes for hours. How can this be done in 15 minutes in the future?

It is utopian to believe that suburban residents can also be included in this concept. Getting to work will still take more than 15 minutes. However, Paris has been implementing the “Grand Paris” concept for years. It foresees that the center is increasingly networked with the periphery. Among other things, the local RER trains and the metro will continue to circulate in the suburbs.

The suburbs should also be better developed with each other. Because today you always have to go to the center of Paris first to move from one suburb to another. The plans were originally supposed to have been implemented by the 2024 Olympics, but now it will definitely take until 2030 before it’s all over. Then it should be possible that many more people today do not have to travel by car in and around Paris, but rather by public transport.

There is also a strong criticism of Hidalgo’s plans: what about political resistance?

There is resistance from conservative politicians in Paris. However, in the last election, the voters voted for a red-green majority and therefore for Hidalgo’s plans. For people in central Paris, Hidalgo’s plans seem quite tempting: not even one in three own a car, but suffer from suburban traffic.

For people living in the Parisian suburbs, however, it is often possible to reach the center only in a reasonable amount of time by car. But now Mayor Hidalgo has only been elected by the population in central Paris, the suburbs are separate communities with their own elected authorities. So those people who influence Hidalgo’s plans the most had nothing to say about it. This widens the gap between “those out there” and “those in there”.

Interview conducted by Janis Fahrländer.