Paris mayor wants limits on cars in centre, end to diesel by 2020

The mayor of Paris on Sunday laid out a plan to limit cars in the city’s historic centre and said she wanted to ban diesel vehicles by 2020. “In the four central districts, apart from bikes, buses and taxis, the only vehicles allowed will be residents’ cars, delivery vehicles and emergency vehicles,” Anne Hidalgo said in an interview with the Journal du Dimanche weekly. Hidalgo said the proposed anti-pollution scheme would start at weekends but could be “quickly” rolled out for the rest of the week. Central Paris has a relatively high population density in European terms and tourists are often surprised by the traffic levels in and around the historic sights of the world’s most visited city.

I want diesel cars out of Paris by 2020 and if possible beyond the peripherique.

Anne Hidalgo, referring to the constantly choked ring road around Paris

The city also experiences periodic pollution spikes forcing authorities to impose temporary speed limits on motorists and even to ban vehicles from running on certain days. Hidalgo said she wanted to limit the traffic on some of the most polluted streets - like the iconic but traffic clogged Champs-Elysees - to “clean vehicles”. As an “experimental” measure, she suggested allowing only ultra-low emitting cars on these major thoroughfares. She also intends to extend zones where the speed limit is fixed at 30 kilometres an hour so that it becomes “the norm in Paris”. And in a bid to get people out of cars and on to bikes, the mayor said the amount of cycle lanes would be doubled by 2020 as part of a 100-million-euro bike development plan.

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