No more ax for Crit’Air 3 cars in Toulouse or Crit’Air 4 in Grenoble. They will be able to continue to drive beyond January 1, 2024. Quite simply because the air quality has improved in these agglomerations, as in that of Reims, during the year 2022, according to published data. speak Citepaan association, whose figures are authoritative. Christophe Bechu, the Minister for the Ecological Transition therefore decided on Tuesday to exempt them from further tightening the traffic restrictions linked to Low Emission Zones (ZFE). Reims had however anticipated the call of itself by postponing the ban on Crit’Air 3 in 2029.
These cities switch to a “vigilance zone”, according to a new classification presented on Monday by the government, and can thus “decide to suspend the next stages of [leur] schedule of restrictions”. This announcement comes after the submission on Monday morning of 25 proposals on EPZs made by Jean-Luc Moudenc, the mayor of the Pink City and president of Toulouse Métropole, and Anne-Marie Jean, vice-president of the Eurometropolis of Strasbourg. The government is giving itself until the fall to prepare the “social acceptability” measures for the recommended EPZs.
Christophe Béchu thus cuts the pear in half, while the RN and LR wanted to abolish the ZFEs and that LFI requested a moratorium in their application.
No change for Paris, Lyon, Aix-Marseille, Rouen and Strasbourg
No relaxation of the calendar, however, for Paris, Lyon, Aix-Marseille, Rouen and Strasbourg. These five metropolises still “regularly” exceed (i.e. three years in the last five years) the regulatory air quality thresholds (40 µg of nitrogen dioxide [NO2] per cubic meter of air). These are classified as “ZFE territories”.
Paris and Lyon must therefore continue to gradually apply the restrictions set by law: ban on Crit’Air 4 on January 1, 2024 (diesel cars over 18 years old), then Crit’Air 3 in 2025 (diesel cars over 14 years old and petrol cars over 19 years old).
The air in the city is not healthy for all that: almost all French cities still exceed the values recommended by the WHO, ie 10 µg of NO2/m3. Only Saint-Nazaire and Le Mans remained below this level in 2022.