2024 Winter Issue of Urban Land - 26

ULI PRIZE FOR VISIONARIES IN URBAN DEVELOPMENT
not help them move towards
electric or hydrogen vehicles,
given the high cost today of
these vehicles, then it will not
work. We need to help them
financially. This change falls
more within the competence
of the national state. We are
pushing for this to be able to
make the question become
the central issue that accounts
for climate and social equity.
When Mayor Anne Hidalgo took office in 2014, she took up the subject
of mobility, which entailed reducing traffic and thereby air pollution.
The redesigned city accommodates pedestrians and bicycles.
UL: What infrastructure
improvements, including roads,
construction of bike lanes,
public transportation, and/or
building retrofits/conversions-
among any other improvements-were
required to
reinvent Paris as a 15-minute
city? How has this been
funded?
economy of our cities, and
the construction of buildings
here. And we are conducting
research to reduce the impact
of construction. So, the cities
are complying, whereas the
states are not.
UL: Can you talk about the
city's " low-emission zone " and
other plans to reduce cars on
Paris streets-like the so-called
" car-free " zone, slated to take
effect in 2024, that will ban
motor vehicles from driving
through much of Paris' 1st to
4th arrondissements? Also,
what has been the predominant
reaction from residents
and visitors?
Anne Hidalgo: It is always
complicated to change
citizens' habits, particularly in
terms of mobility. The good
thing for mayors who decided
to introduce low-emission
zones is that in the hearts of
our cities, the public transportation
is great-Paris is a city
where we have a very high
density of public transport-
we have a metro station or a
bus station less than 10 minutes'
walk all over the city.
Therefore, the issue is not
really with the people who
already live in the large urban
center but with the journeys
between the periphery and
the center. The first solutions
are with public transport-that
is to say, offering this possibility
of transport, including
to people who have longer
distances from the periphery
to the center, or quite simply
going from the periphery to
the suburbs.
So, for several years now,
we have been working on the
" Grand Paris Express. " In the
coming years, with the Olympic
Games and after, there will
be an even larger transport
network that will serve the
whole of Greater Paris and
the Île-de-France region much
better.
Then we obviously have
to avoid what we call " transit
traffic. " People who enter
Paris, pass through Paris,
do not stop in the city but
do create a flow of vehicles
and pollution. It explains why
these limited traffic zones are
extremely important. They
allow in the city only those
who have something to do
in the city with their vehicle
to enter. And then there is, of
course, a social subject. We
need to support the middle
and working classes, artisans,
and tradespeople, who need
their vehicles to commute
and to get around; if we do
Anne Hidalgo: The transformation
of our infrastructure,
for example, towards cycling,
has allowed us to reduce pollution
by 40 percent. This is
a concrete, measurable result
that we have today. I can also
tell you, for example, that, in
terms of housing construction,
the city of Paris today has 25
percent social housing [a.k.a.,
affordable housing], which
makes our city a socially
mixed city.
UL: Next year you will welcome
the entire world at
the Olympic Games. Among
many other projects, you have
promised to make the Seine
swimmable. Are you going to
achieve this? More generally,
how have the Olympic Games
been useful for you as mayor?
Anne Hidalgo: I love sport.
Now the Olympics Games, for
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2024 Winter Issue of Urban Land

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