Paris is a longstanding travel destination for those seeking romance, adventure, French cuisine, and the savoir-faire for which the French are famous. But many travelers are surprised at the changes they find in the French capital as of now, and more are coming.
Visitors hear discussions of the ville de quinze minutes, or ville du quart-heure, both expressions referring to a fifteen-minute city. The twenty municipal districts of Paris, the famed arrondissements, are undergoing changes transforming the city. Each of the arrondissements is becoming more self-sufficient, self-sustaining, and more eco-friendly with a reduced carbon footprint. Here are just some of the various big changes taking place in the City of Lights.
30. Self-Sufficient Neighborhoods
Current plans aim at creating self-sufficient communities within each of the city’s neighborhoods. The goal of making each capable of providing services required by its residents is ambitious but already underway.
Groceries, bakeries, restaurants, cafes, schools, laundries, medical care, and all the needs of the urban population within walking or cycling distance of the home is the primary goal. Bicycle lanes along all streets of Paris, with protected lanes where needed, will make all services reachable within roughly 15 minutes from home.
29. Car-Free Sundays
In October 2018, Paris introduced the concept of car-free days on the first Sunday of each month. A plan for the program to be extended to one day per week throughout the entire city is under discussion. As of this writing, the program affects only the center city. During the car-free period, from 10 AM to 6 PM, noise levels in the city center drop by more than 3 decibels.
Following the success of the program in the city center, the first through the fourth arrondissements joined the program. Special dispensations for city residents, delivery vehicles, and others allow access through designated points with severely restricted speeds (20 kmph, or 12 mph).
28. Urban Farms
Porte de Versailles, served by both the Metro and the Tramway, is the site of an urban rooftop farm claimed to be the largest in the world. On the roof of the six-story cultural center, nearly 3.5 acres of aeroponic gardens scheduled for planting in the spring of 2020 will provide fresh produce for Parisians.
Private plots for citizens number 140, and farmer’s markets, tours, and classes in sustainable farming are offered. The gardens use less than 10% of the water required by traditional growing methods. Produce from the farm will be available on-site and in the city’s restaurants and supermarkets, all grown less than 15 minutes from the Eiffel Tower.
27. Cleaning The Seine For Recreation
Paris will host the Summer Olympic Games in 2024. A major initiative of the city is to have the Seine clean enough to swim in before the games begin that July. The initiative ensures the cleanliness of the river. It includes the creation of swimming facilities and urban beach recreation areas in five locations along the Seine within city limits.
One, planned for the fourth arrondissement, includes views of the Cathedral of Notre Dame. In 2017, the man-made lake known as the Bassin de la Villette Canal was converted into an urban swimming and recreation facility. It was well-received, encouraging plans for 23 similar facilities on the Seine, with many outside the city serving outlying communities.
26. Vertical Gardens
Murs Vegetaux – living walls – grow on the outer walls of some Paris buildings, with more added every year. The vegetation improves air quality, cools the city, and offers aesthetic enhancement. The practice began with a French botanist, Patrick Blanc. In 2013, he installed more than 7,600 plants, including over 230 species, on the walls of a building at the corner of Rue des Petits Carreaux.
It expanded to cover about 25 square meters of the façade. The Musee de Quai Branly, a museum in the 7th arrondissement, features a living wall with more than 15,000 plants. They include ferns, fuchsias, irises, and flowering plants dedicated to peace and the environment.
25. Green Hotels
Parisian hotels vie for an award known as the Green Key, an international label of eco-friendly accommodations. One, the budget-priced Solar Hotel, takes its name from the solar panels on its roof which supply electricity to its lights.
The Solar Hotel uses recycled materials in furnishings and wherever possible, ecological, no volatile organic compounds paints, (VOCs). It offers free bicycle use to its customers, and serves only organic foods. The hotel collects rainwater for its gardens. It is far from the only such hotel found in Paris, where the number of eco-friendly hotels grows annually at all price ranges.
24. Organic Markets & Produce
In Paris, those desiring organic products should look for the word biologique. The number of markets in Paris which feature organic products continues to grow. In the 18th arrondissement, a market known as La Recyclerie offers honey from hives on the premises. It also offers produce from its own gardens, and eggs from cage-free chickens raised on the premises.
Several of Paris’s street markets offer entirely organic products, as do numerous cafes and restaurants, even including some bearing Michelin stars. Like all of Paris, access to the markets through pedestrian-friendly means (and bikes) remains a priority among city planners and administrators.
23. Fewer cars
Paris suffers from some of the worst air pollution in Europe during the summer months and has taken steps to remove the biggest contributor, high emissions from automobiles. The city bans cars built before 1997 from the city center during weekdays. It also bans diesel powered vehicles built before 2006.
One of the initiatives behind the 15-minute city consists of making cars less convenient than more eco-friendly transportation. Removing parking spaces at the rate of 55,000 per year and replacing them with green spaces and recreational facilities complies with the initiative. The city also set aside some thoroughfares for the use of electric or hydrogen vehicles only.
22. More Mass Transportation
The bus system in Paris uses only electric and biogas powered vehicles. Expanding it became a priority at the outset of the 21st century. In addition to buses, Paris offers the Metro, a regional light rail network known as the RER, and the Tramway. It also offers bike-sharing that includes electric bikes and electric scooters.
Expansion of public transit will make it even more convenient in the future. Some initiatives suggest making the system free, or nearly so, for residents of the city. Improvements to the public transit system remain a major part of the city’s plan to reduce the number of automobiles clogging the streets and roads of Paris.
21. More Green Spaces
Built by order of Napoleon I, the Pont d’Iena Bridge honors the victory of the French over the Prussians at the Battle of Jena. It became a major traffic artery across the Seine, rebuilt to accommodate automobile and truck traffic in the 1930s. In 2019, Paris announced a plan to close the bridge to vehicular traffic except for public transportation and emergency vehicles.
Under the plan, the bridge would carry pedestrian traffic through tree-shaded grassy areas, with fountains and open spaces, to the base of the Eiffel Tower.
20. Pedestrianized Parks
The plans for the Pont d’Iena bridge, when completed, create the largest pedestrianized garden in the city. When the city announced the plan, it projected completion date for the first phase of 2024 in time for the Olympic Games.
The area encompassed by the proposed project currently features heavy vehicular traffic, which the project eliminates. The mile-long stretch with the Eiffel Tower in its center consists of two new public squares and connecting bike and walking paths. It includes underground facilities for kiosks and storage facilities, and ticket booths for the entertainments offered. They include access to the Eiffel Tower, the ticket sales of which fund the entire project.
19. The Triangle Tower
First proposed in 2008, a new skyscraper altering the Paris skyline is finally set to begin construction in 2020. The 42-story, glass-covered triangle will house a hotel, working spaces, health and daycare centers, and restaurants and cafes. The design causes the building to appear in different shapes depending on the viewing angle and perspective. Located near the Tour de Montparnesse, it is a divisive building among Parisians.
The tower will rise nearly 600 feet, clad in reflective glass. Numerous court decisions over lawsuits to prevent the Triangle Tower delayed construction, though project leaders hope to complete the building in time for the 2024 Olympics.
18. La Barge Craft Brewing
Paris and the whole country of France generally bring wine to mind, at least among Americans. Many will be pleased to learn that the craft brewing of beers and ciders is popular in Paris. La Barge brings craft brewing and the distribution of beer to another level.
The Brasserie Barge takes a renovated former stables and courtyard along the Seine in Saint-Denis, using it for a brewery, taproom, and visitor center. A barge alongside serves as storage for the beer and distributes it to sites along the river. Electric scooters carry the beer the rest of the distance to its destination. The project, already underway, is one of many reinventing the city’s relationship with Seine and eliminates the need for delivery trucks adding to traffic.
17. Le Peripherique
Le Peripherique – the periphery – is the ring of roadways surrounding the city of Paris, what Americans call a beltway. Several pending changes for the French roads lie ahead. One is a proposal for reduced speed limits. Since 2014, 70 kmph, or about 43 mph, is the maximum legal speed. One proposal recommends lowering it to 50 kmph, or 31 mph.
Another specifies establishing lanes solely for the use of clean energy vehicles and public transportation. Yet another envisions protected bike lanes and pedestrian lanes on the periphery by the end of the decade.
16. Milles Arbres
If approved and built as proposed, Milles Arbres will sit on the side of the Peripherique at Porte Maillot. Literally meaning 1,000 trees, the building, shaped like a ship, will be 10 stories high with three subterranean levels. Housing private homes, a hotel, restaurants, office spaces, and daycare, and trees will line its roof and exterior, they will add to the efforts to clean the air of the city.
Opposite the project on the other side of the highway, another eco-friendly project built largely of wood will add more greenery to the city’s landscape.
15. Multistrates
The Multistrates project adds two buildings, constructed mostly of wood, one of seven stories and the other of nine. The taller of the two houses residential units, the other office spaces. Each of the buildings will have rooftop gardens, including collective gardens and greenhouses.
Exterior gardens on the levels of the office tower add further plants to help filter the air and lower temperatures within the building. Combined with Milles Arbres, the projects create a “Green Lung” for the city’s heavily-traveled traffic corridor and recover areas of the city largely disused for years.
14. Driverless Electric Vehicles
As part of the push to eliminate automobile traffic and pollution, the Mayor’s office of Paris announced a plan to make the first four arrondissements car-free at all times and permanently, allowing only for emergency vehicles. To accommodate those unable to walk or ride a bike, the city will provide electric shuttles.
Driverless shuttles save money since there is no need to pay the driver. Experiments with driverless vehicles have been underway in Paris, including along its oldest and most winding streets, for several years.
13. Recovered Railyards
The former railyards of the Ordoner-Poissonniers Railway, underused and in decay, is under conversion into a sustainable urban development, due for completion in 2024. The site includes homes for over 1,000 residents, offices and shops, open parks, recreation areas, and urban farming spaces.
On-site renewable energy sources include both solar and wind. The entire site is carbon neutral. Green spaces appear on the ground level, on rooftops, and on terraces. The entire site covers just over nine acres, known as the Mecano Jardins, which translates to Mechanical Gardens.
12. No Notre Dame Cathedral
The fire that ravaged the Cathedral of Notre Dame in 2019 may have damaged the building to the point of it being unsalvageable. The cathedral was under renovation at the time of the fire, with about 50,000 tubes of scaffolding installed. The fire melted the metal tubes, which require removal before repairs to the building can begin.
Meanwhile, the twisted mass of melted metal threatens to collapse into the vaults, which are all that holds up the remaining building after the loss of the roof. Unthinkable or not, saving one of the city’s most iconic buildings is uncertain. Experts say there is a 50% chance the building will not be saved and restored.
11. Less Industrial Space
Les Halles Pouchard was once the site for the manufacturing of steel pipes in northern Paris on the Ourcq Canal. Once reclamation is complete, the almost 25-acre site will offer a hotel, gardens, restaurants, and a theater. Art galleries and recreational facilities including running paths will create a community-based destination at what was once an abandoned industrial facility.
Scheduled to open in 2021, the facility will also maintain a museum dedicated to its former use as a pipe manufacturer. Other former manufacturing facilities of Paris will undergo similar transformations.
10. Even More Urban Farms
As a city with extensive rooftop gardens, increasing urban greenspaces, and living walls, Paris is taking the growing of plants further. In 2016 the city announced the Parisculteurs project, an initiative to make one-third of the city’s green spaces dedicated to urban farming.
Produce from the farms appears in the city’s markets and restaurants. Entrepreneurial farmers lease space on Paris rooftops from the building’s owner, and create farm spaces under the strict supervision of representatives of the city. By 2030, well over half of the produce consumed by the city of Paris will grow within city limits.
9. A Model City Within The City
Vitry-sur-Seine is the site of a major renovation of a formerly working-class industrialized area. About 750 acres of railway yards and crumbling industrial buildings occupy the site. Transforming it into a model metropolitan urban core is underway in the Ardoines project. The project creates intermodal transportation links, including the Metro and the suburban rail line, the RER.
Abandoned rail lines from the area’s industrial past require removal to reconnect neighborhoods. Declared a project of national interest by the government, it includes several phases over the next decade.
8. Les Ardoines Contains An Element of Risk
The Les Ardoines project connects to the Seine, placing it at some risk. Higher water levels increase the risk of flooding and damages to the project’s many phases and ambitious goals. The project offers considerable rewards as well, among them the creation of a modern community designed for the future.
Reclamation of land formerly denuded of plant life for both leisure and urban farming benefits the immediate community and future generations. The Les Ardoines project was the winner of the “Inventing Greater Paris Metropolis” competition, though the plan remains in development in 2020.
7. The Grand Paris Project
Grand Paris is a project designed to encompass two decades of growth in the communities surrounding the central city. Once complete, the metropolitan area will increase seven times and the population about 3.5 times.
Grand Paris will include the city, three suburban departments (Seine-St. Denis, Val-de-Marne, and Hauts-de-Seine) and outlying communities. Key to the plan’s success is an entirely new mass transit system, fully automated and running around the edge of the region connecting the suburbs to each other as well as to the city center.
6. The Grand Paris Express
A new rail system that runs outside the city in a loop, comprised of four lines covering about 125 miles, is intended to decrease automobile traffic from entering the city. Interconnected with the Metro and RER lines, the system will simplify rail travel to and from the suburbs.
Sixty-eight new rail stations surrounding Paris support the system. The plan calls for the stations’ completion by 2035. They will be placed in neighborhoods easily traversed by bicycles and pedestrian walkways, allowing commuting to the city and between the suburbs without the necessity of driving in private vehicles.
5. Making Neighborhoods More Energy Efficient
Another part of the Grand Paris plan includes improving the energy efficiency of existing buildings. The plan includes the consolidation of district heating systems and using a greater portion of renewable heating sources. Up to 50% of energy from geothermal and waste-to-energy systems is planned.
The overall plan reduces energy use by eliminating the need for automobiles and improving the manner in which citizens heat and cool their homes and places of employment. The green spaces and rooftops of Paris will be expanded into the outer areas through the Grand Paris plan, which also creates a more effective means of governing and policing the unified community.
4. Shortened Commutes
The Grand Paris Express design alters the way companies do business in Paris and its outlying communities. Upon completion, travel time of 34 minutes from Charles de Gaulle Airport to the city’s business center will replace the current time of 53 minutes. Trains spaced only two to three minutes apart ensure shorter waiting time, and less crowding at stations and on the trains themselves.
About 90% of the rail system will run underground, reducing noise and allowing the use of the land above the tracks. Stations will also serve as shopping and eating centers and contain business centers in several locations. Projections of use include up to 2 million passengers using the system daily, removing thousands of automobiles from streets and parking lots.
3. Improved Environment
Through the removal of large numbers of cars from the roads and streets, the Grand Paris Express reduces emissions in the region. Environmental impact studies claim the system will save over 27 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions by the mid-21st century. The new stations built for the system will simultaneously boost the economy, with an estimated 400,000 housing units built in the areas around the new stations.
Overall the system is expected to generate over 115,000 new jobs and attract hundreds of thousands more through business relocation and startups in the regions served by its stations.
2. 68 New Urban Hubs
Planners for the Grand Paris Express envision new urban hubs springing up in the area around the stations, with the stations as the epicenter. Though primarily designed to be convenient transfer points for commuters, they also contain services and shopping facilities. Accessible from pedestrian walkways and bicycle lanes, they attract construction of entertainment, recreation, and living facilities.
The facilities will also be part of the digital highway, with fully automated services and trains, Wi-fi and mobile networks, and customized data services.
1. A Clean, Modern, and Different City
Paris will retain most of its old sights and charms, though the plans afoot do promise enormous changes to the city. By 2035, the city will be one of the largest urban areas in Europe, as well as one of its largest agricultural producers. Parisians and visitors will dine on produce grown literally over their heads as many already do.
The future of the city features fewer cars, cleaner air, cleaner water, and less noise pollution. A city already noted for its green spaces will be greener still. Reclaimed industrial areas and neighborhoods overlooking swimmers frolicking in the Seine or along the promenades is its promise. The process is already well underway.