Le Figaro Bordeaux
To discover
Follow all the news of the city of Bordeaux
Vegetate "
wherever possible
", give pride of place to "
soft mobility
" and fight against urban heat islands by rethinking certain spaces that are too concrete.
So many measures taken by the environmental municipality of Bordeaux since it came to power in 2020, with a concrete impact on the place of the car in the city.
Changes more and more visible and assumed by the town hall, which does not want to point the drivers.
"
The parking spaces will always be there, because today we do not know how to do otherwise than with the car
", explains Didier Jeanjean, deputy mayor in charge of nature in the city and peaceful neighborhoods, citing pell-mell the vehicles delivery and those of local residents and professionals who need to use their vehicle.
"
We don't have a parking program
", explains the elected official, but "
a rebalancing program
" of the roads in order to "
identify the heat islands and restore them
".
A program which, punctually, can be brought to “
affect some parking spaces
”.
Read alsoIn Bordeaux, paid parking continues to expand
An emblematic example of these redevelopments is the Billaudel plot, the center of which was occupied by thirteen parking spaces, and which since 2020 has become an "
urban microforest
", not far from the Sacré-Coeur church in Bordeaux.
The removal of these parking spaces did not go smoothly with local residents.
The course of the Somme, identified as a heat island, will also be vegetated.
“
We are going to put trees from Place de la Victoire to Place Nansouty, and this artery will become a refreshed artery
,” explains Didier Jeanjean.
Good news to fight against the summer heat and to reduce pollution, but “
for each tree planted, a parking space will be removed
”.
Wangari Muta Maathai Square, transformed into an “urban microforest” in 2021, previously had thirteen parking spaces.
DR / Thomas Sanson - City of Bordeaux
“Taking the car away in town is a utopia”
Hoping for a better sharing of roads, recalling that "
70% of space is occupied by cars in Bordeaux even though they represent only 30% of users
", Didier Jeanjean affirms for example that it would be necessary "
absolutely encourage on-site parking [in car parks] rather than on the road
”.
A Twitter account using free access data also publishes the daily occupancy rate of the hypercentre's underground car parks, which hovers around 60%, representing thousands of free places.
There is therefore "
a very significant potential for places
" in these underground car parks, recognizes Didier Jeanjean.
The democratization of their use would make it possible to avoid “
the search for places
”, which leads vehicles to drive longer.
To encourage the use of these underground car parks, the town hall has adapted its prices.
"
If you park in Bordeaux for a quarter of an hour, it's cheaper to be on the road than in a car park, but from two hours, it's better to be in an underground car park, and from four , you have to go back to the parking meter
”, outlines Didier Jeanjean.
New limited sectors will also be set up in the city, as was the case at Chartrons.
“
The bounded sector makes it possible to remove transit traffic while protecting residents and people who work in these neighborhoods
”, explains the elected official.
“
Today it's utopian to say that we have to remove the car from the city.
On the other hand, what is realistic is to develop alternatives, such as car sharing or the express bus.
"Once all these alternatives are in place, "
perhaps we can move a little further
“, ventures Didier Jeanjean.
Although it is not directly targeted by development policies, the car is therefore likely to be less and less present in the Bordeaux public space in the years to come.
