Paris is to rip out a major highway along the right bank of the Seine and create waterside gardens and walkways in its place.
The new pedestrian zone will extend from the Bastille to the Eiffel Tower.
The €8 million project will be put to public consultation in June to decide how much of the existing road network should be closed to traffic. Rush hours bring some 2,700 vehicles onto this road every hour.
Former mayor Bertrand Delanoë pedestrianised some of the Seine’s left bank between the Pont Royal and the Pont de l’Alma in the summer of 2013, a move considered successful by city officials but which has incensed drivers.
Now Socialist mayor Anne Hidalgo risks further fueling motorists’ ire. Already the 40 Million Motorists group has launched an online petition to counter the move.
A spokesman claims the existing closure has aggravated traffic problems and impacted on local and regional economies.
Hidalgo has said that a certain philosophy is needed in the campaign to eliminate cars from the French capital’s heart. “It’s an urban project, something almost philosophical, which involves envisaging the city in an alternative way than through the use of cars,” Hidalgo said, noting that “reconquering the banks of the Seine” would be one of the highlights of her administration.
In recent years, the annual beach festival in the city turns the riverbank into an area of sand and palm trees. If the pedestrian plan goes ahead, the area could be free of traffic by 2016.
City Hall experts say such pedestrianisation would result in an average drop of 15% in nitrogen dioxide levels as well as a reduction in noise pollution.
The initial plan could close the Georges Pompidou highway for almost three miles, giving 4.5 hectares for pedestrians. The second plan would involve shutting nearly one mile of highway for 2.6 hectares.
