Motorized two-wheelers, cars… She brought them all in line! Since Monday, August 30, Anne Hidalgo, the socialist mayor of Paris has had the maximum authorized speed in the capital limited to 30 km / h. The continuation of a long series of measures aimed at limiting the place of the automobile in the capital, after the closure of the lanes on the banks, the establishment of paid parking for two wheels, or even the increase in the price of parking.
“Anti-car” for the opposition, ecological and safe for her teams, Anne Hidalgo’s transport policy in any case arouses the support of a majority of Parisians: 61% of them, according to a survey Ifop *, are therefore in favor of measuring 30 km / h. A dynamic common to all large cities, according to another survey ** from the same institute, according to which nearly two-thirds of the inhabitants of the 40 cities with more than 100,000 inhabitants are in favor of reducing the place of automobile.
“Anne Hidalgo accentuates the territorial fractures”
Except that the Town Hall is no longer the only concern of Anne Hidalgo, who must formalize her candidacy for the presidential election of 2022 on Sunday, in Rouen. And in a country where 74% of the working population (or 18.4 million people) use a motor vehicle to get to work, such measures, especially among the working classes, risk representing a hell of a brake in the presidential campaign of the future candidate. “It is true that outside large cities, adherence to measures to reduce the place of the automobile is much less consensual, according to our studies, 51% of French people are still opposed to it. Anne Hidalgo should not forget that 24% of the population lives in rural communities, ”analyzes Frédéric Dabi, Director General of Ifop.
For his political opponents, especially in the heart of the Île-de-France region, chaired by the right of Valérie Pécresse, criticism is all the easier. “When we see how Paris is managed, we can have legitimate concerns about what it would be able to do once president,” tackle Othman Nasrou (LR), second vice-president of the Ile-de-France region. He deplores the complicated collaboration between the municipality of the capital and its region: “May Madame Hidalgo satisfy her electorate, very well. That she take ecological measures, very good. But what we deplore is the lack of consultation. By managing Paris as if the latter were cut off from its region, it accentuates the territorial fractures, but it seems to me that this is one of the major challenges of this presidential election. “
For Othman Nasrou, Anne Hidalgo’s desire to remove a lane from the Paris ring road and install red lights is a key example. “What the mayor of Paris forgets here is that the vast majority of journeys made on the ring road are by Ile-de-France residents. Yet it seems to me that they too are essential to the economy of the capital. Why stigmatize them at all costs? He asks himself.
“We must not confuse the municipal and the national”
Within the Socialist Party, we prefer to see it as a force: “Anne Hidalgo shows remarkable ecological voluntarism, her policies are sometimes twitchy, of course, but as mayor of Paris, her priority remains the Parisians, she does not. ‘only kept his commitments,’ underlines Rémi Féraud, socialist senator close to the future presidential candidate. “But we must not confuse the municipal and the national, he warns. If she is elected president, the French as a whole will be her priority, and social justice will be a compass. Emmanuel Macron sparked the Yellow Vest crisis with a tax policy that was too hard on the underprivileged classes, this error will not be ours ”.
By becoming a presidential candidate, the image of herself that Anne Hidalgo wants to send back will undoubtedly not remain the same. His will, described in The Obs, to set up a “French team of mayors”, is an example. “It will be an opportunity for her to detach herself from her Parisianism and to compensate for her lack of experience in the territories. She will highlight her pugnacity, her capacity for medium-term projection, but also her origins as a daughter of immigrants. Making a copy / paste of its municipal policy would have very little echo ”, projects Frédéric Dabi.
This same Parisianism still runs the risk of sticking to his skin. “Anne Hidalgo, unlike other candidates who had the same municipal function, did not exercise any other position of responsibility. Jacques Chirac, for example, had strong territorial ties in Corrèze and had already been a minister. It is undeniably a weakness and some candidates, like Arnaud Montebourg with his speech “France from below” are already starting to build in opposition to his image, “observes political scientist Frédéric Sawicki. If she wants to have a chance in 2022, let’s hope that Anne Hidalgo’s “France team of mayors” doesn’t come to the rescue by car…