THOMAS SAMSON / AFP
Vehicles traveling on the Paris ring road, near Porte d’Orléans, May 11, 2020.
TRANSPORT – Clément Beaune disowned Anne Hidalgo this Thursday, December 7 in the franceinfo morning show. The State “will not validate” at the end of 2024 the limitation to 50 km/h on the Paris ring road desired by the Paris town hall after the Olympic Games, announced the Minister of Transport.
“I think it’s not a good idea in the short term to have this speed limit” And “at the end of 2024, we will not make the decision, we will not validate the decision” to limit the speed to 50 km/h, he explained on Franceinfo.
Anne Hidalgo explained at the end of November her desire to limit the speed on the ring road to 50 km/h after the 2024 summer Olympics, in addition to reserving one of the lanes for carpooling – a revolution supposed to protect the environment but which arouses, since then, a lively political controversy.
The ring road, one of the main urban axes in Europe, is used every day by 1.2 million vehicles, the majority from Ile-de-France, and 80% of which travel with their driver as the sole occupant.
Reassuring about transport during the 2024 Olympics
This new speed limit aims to make traffic flow more smoothly on this very congested route, by encouraging Ile-de-France residents to avoid traffic.“autosolism” and take public transport.
This measure mainly aims to reduce pollution and noise pollution, particularly at night for the 500,000 people who live in the immediate vicinity of this axis, often in working-class neighborhoods, according to Paris town hall.
The maximum speed authorized on this 35-kilometer road belt which has surrounded the capital since 1973, had already increased from 90 km/h to 80 in 1993, then to 70 in 2014. Since 2021, the speed has also been limited to 30 km /h in most streets of the capital.
If the device “is managed by the City of Paris”a change in the speed limit requires “obviously a validation of the State”argued Clément Beaune, saying however ” open “ to the idea of a reserved lane. “I think the reserved lane is a good thing”, he noted. But if, at the same time, the speed limit increases to 50 km/h, “I think you’re going to drive people crazy.”he continued.
Furthermore, faced with the alerts which have multiplied recently on Parisian transport during the Olympic Games this summer, the minister wanted to be reassuring. “All spectators for all Olympic venues will be able to get there by public transport. No host city has done this, we will do it”he said on franceinfo.
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