The city that gives its name to the international treaty against climate change wants to be one of the first in the world to adapt its urbanism to rising temperatures. The Council of Paris, the assembly of the capital, examines on Monday the new Local Urban Plan (PLU, for its acronym in French) presented by the team of the mayor, the socialist Anne Hidalgo, allied with ecologists and communists. This plan involves, among other measures, increasing green areas, replacing concrete or tar cladding with earth ones, promoting the rehabilitation of buildings or forcing the production of renewable energy in all real estate projects of more than 1,000 square meters. In addition, it also affects the social aspect with an increase in the public housing stock. If approved, it must still be analyzed by the State, with a view to a final vote at the end of 2024 or the beginning of 2025.
"This new local bioclimatic urban plan (...) it is our global political vision," said the Franco-Spanish Hidalgo, who has governed the city since 2014, at the start of the council session. The new framework is part of the changes undertaken by the capital authorities in recent years, with more spaces for pedestrians and the construction of hundreds of kilometers of bike lanes. The French capital has also implemented the "city of 15 minutes", which seeks to reorganize the city so that each citizen has all the services they need on a daily basis, from shops and medical centers to parks and entertainment venues.
The City Council considers that there are two main emergencies for the coming decades. On the one hand, adapting the city to the effects of the climate crisis, which will make episodes of extreme heat more frequent. On the other, to offer affordable housing to its more than 2.1 million inhabitants.
The population of Paris (excluding the metropolitan area) has declined considerably in recent years, a situation that can be attributed to, among other things, the high price of housing. Between 2012 and 2022, the city lost more than 122,000 inhabitants, according to figures from the national statistics institute. The council's goal is to aim for 40% public housing by 2035, which includes 30% social housing and 10% affordable housing.
More trees and more green spaces
One of the main objectives of the new framework is to achieve an additional 2035 hectares of green space by 70, with the expansion of some existing parks and the creation of others. And, in the longer term, increase this revegetation to 300 new hectares in 2040 [to get an idea of what it means, the El Retiro park in Madrid has an area of 120 hectares]. Trees help absorb greenhouse gas emissions, but they also provide shade and contribute to mitigating the heat island effect in cities. The idea is to "vegetate" as many places as possible, such as courtyards, schools, rooftops or even the facades of buildings. The City Council also wants to massively plant trees on the embankments of the peripheral ring, the capital's ring road. The goal is to achieve 10 m² of green space per inhabitant, as recommended by the WHO. The challenge is great, because currently, Parisians have 5.8 m², not counting the forests of Boulogne and Vincennes, reports the newspaper Le Monde.
The council also plans to create a large park of 25 hectares in the north of Paris and another 10 in different areas of the city. In addition, it gives special protection to 250 remarkable trees and 100,000 alignment trees and establishes as irreversible the progressive conversion into pedestrian space since 2012 of the banks of the Seine, which in the past had been a fast road to cross the city, and against which the right in opposition opposed, Efe reports.
The plan includes measures to reduce the emissions that cause climate change, such as the promotion of renewables or cycling, and others to adapt to rising temperatures, such as the "waterproofing" of 40% of public space by mid-century, replacing concrete or tar coatings with earth ones.
With regard to construction, the demolition of buildings to build new ones is the exception and priority is given to the rehabilitation of those already built. The plan allows the height of existing buildings to be increased, but on condition that this serves to create housing and the "deconcreting" of courtyards.
With all these measures, the urban plan of the French capital plans to reach climate neutrality in 2050. The document that will draw the future physiognomy of Paris, of 3000 pages, comes after three years of arduous negotiations, led by the first deputy of the mayor in charge of urban planning, Emmanuel Grégoire. The current plan that governs the city – and that defines the orientations in terms of planning and planning of the territory – is from 2006.
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