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Friday, March 29, 2024

Cars make way for two-wheel revolution in Paris

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Paris—With the wind rushing through their hair, they zip past on bikes, electric scooters, and monowheels, effortlessly passing lines of hot-and-bothered drivers stuck in the endless Paris traffic.

Cars make way for two-wheel revolution in Paris

In the French capital, the new mobility revolution has caught on fast, with locals and tourists embracing the growing array of app-based ways to get around.

And with climate change bringing frequent heatwaves and more peak pollution alerts, Paris is beginning to push back against the dominance of the car.

Not only is the city upgrading its public transport system offering of interurban trains, buses, and the metro, it is also enjoying an unparalleled explosion of alternatives.

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“Our cities have been colonized by cars. They get into the smallest gaps, today we need to put them back into their proper place,” says Christophe Najdovski, the city’s deputy mayor who has responsibility for transport.

“In Paris, they are only used for 10 percent of daily trips but they take up 50 percent of the public space.”

Today, just over a third – 37 percent – of Parisian homes have a car, and that drops to one in five in the city center, according to the mayor’s office.

“The priority is to enable city dwellers to get around,” says Jean-Pierre Orfeuil, an engineer who specializes in urban mobility. “Generally speaking, those who are using these new means of transport are people who used to use the metro,” he said. “So they haven’t played a role in easing the traffic.” 

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