At the end of the afternoon of the week, on the Place de la Concorde (8th arrondissement), the traffic is dense but the traffic remains surprisingly fluid.
At least on the Seine side.
At the other end of the square, a change of atmosphere.
Private cars, buses, taxis and even two-wheelers that do not have the place to go up the lines congregate at the entrance of the rue Royale ... occupied by an uninterrupted line of vehicles to the stop in a horn concert.
Read alsoAfter the Covid, we do not support the return of traffic jams
The replacement of the paving stones of the prestigious artery - which must still last three weeks - occupies all the center of the road and requires the postponement of traffic on a single lane in each direction instead of three in normal times. From morning to evening, it takes a minimum of 10 minutes to cover the 300 meters that separate Concorde from the Church of the Madeleine. This congestion point, which went relatively unnoticed when the work began in mid-April, has become much more "visible" to motorists since the gradual return to normal.
And many of them are unleashed on social networks to denounce road works that would have been imprudently launched simultaneously with the resumption of traffic in the streets of the capital.
"This is not the case", slice Jacques Baudrier, the deputy (PCF) to the mayor of Paris in charge of "the coordination of work on public space", providing supporting figures that the sites, at time T, are not more numerous than before the health crisis.
“There may have been a small catching-up effect for concessionaires' sites (maintenance of water, gas, district heating, telephone networks) due to delays during periods of confinement.
But overall, we remain a number of sites identical to that of previous years for this period of the year ”, assures the elected.
According to data from the City of Paris, a little more than 6,000 projects having an impact on public space are currently underway in the capital.
The number may seem huge.
But 50% of these sites relate to the building sector (renovations, repairs, constructions) and encroach very little on the public highway.
40% are due to dealership operations and essentially disrupt pedestrian traffic!
The worksites linked to road works represent, for their part, only 4.7% of the total number of works ... but they alone occupy 25% of the surfaces under construction.
Two "super sites" in the north-west
However, these are two public transport improvement projects that currently pose the most problems for motorists. This is on the one hand the extension of Eole and the installation of the site base in the heart of the Porte Maillot roundabout (16th-17th century), transformed into hell for motorists at each peak period. . It also concerns the extension of the T3b tramway (over 3.5 km from the Porte d'Asnières to the Porte Dauphine), the rights-of-way of which cut widely on the Boulevard des Maréchaux.
Apart from these two “super-projects” (which should both last for several more years), the other works in progress in the capital are not of a nature to explain on their own the return of traffic jams in the city. capital city. Adopted at the start of the year, the new site rationalization procedure (which aims to concentrate work in a given district to avoid a scattering of work) will not produce its effects until the next school year.
But in the meantime, Jacques Baudrier rejects criticism of a capital in perpetual construction. “There aren't any more than before! What has changed, however, is the perception of traffic jams by motorists. Many of them were no longer used to being subjected to them. They no longer support them, ”concludes the elected Parisian who sees it as an encouragement to continue the municipal policy of transition to more sustainable modes of travel than the car.
