The limited traffic zone (ZTL) in the center of Paris, which aims to prohibit traffic in the hypercentre to unauthorized vehicles, will see the light of day in early 2024, just before the Olympic Games, confirmed the mayor of the capital. , Anne Hidalgo (PS), during an interview with Agence France-Presse. At the start of 2022, the elected socialist had decided to postpone the implementation of this flagship project for her second term by a year and a half.
This ZTL must reduce the place of the car in the hypercentre of the capital – the first four arrondissements, plus the parts of the VeVIe and VIIe located between Boulevard Saint-Germain and the Seine – by prohibiting so-called “transit” traffic, which represents 50% of current traffic, according to the Town Hall.
The majority on the left had justified this postponement by the need to ” take time “ an impact study and a public inquiry which must involve residents, transport authorities, traders and department stores. “We keep to deadlinessays Anne Hidalgo. We will send our file to the environmental authority in the coming weeks for a public inquiry at the end of the summer. »
Convince the Chief of Police
At the same time, the former PS candidate in the presidential election must convince the prefect of police Laurent Nunez, whose predecessor Didier Lallement had expressed “strong reservations about the project as envisaged” by the City of Paris.
“We are still discussing, in very good intelligence, the perimeter with the Prefecture of Police. These arrangements will not prevent it from continuing to carry out its mission of protecting Parisians., promises Anne Hidalgo. The Prefecture of Police is indeed located in the heart of the perimeter planned for the ZTL, on the Ile de la Cité.
For the former prefect, the Town Hall project risked generating “difficulties for the movement of emergency and police services on the outskirts of the area” and a “negative impact for the economic activity of the capital”.
Relations between the Prefecture and the Town Hall have improved significantly since the change of prefect, even if opposition persists, such as on the project to pedestrianize the axis of the Eiffel Tower, suspended due to opposition from the State. .
In early March, Lyon’s green majority unveiled a plan to pedestrianize the city’s inner city and limit motor vehicle traffic there by 2026. Unauthorized motorists will therefore have to bypass ZTLs there, a measure already deployed in cities such as Nantes, Rennes and Grenoble.