Paris has the perfect solution for Olympic traffic, even if many people will hate it

In a perfectly Parisian solution to the expected influx of tourists for the Olympic games, and the resulting traffic, city officials have been hard at work. And the answer has proven to be getting half of those wheels off the road.

Paris has spent years doubling down on its two-wheeled solution, pushing larger cars and vans out of the city center in favor of bikes and scooters. It’s a move that has left many hardcore car proponents vexed, but has had a remarkable impact on the city.

The city has used various methods, from paying residents up to $4,000 to replace their old gas-guzzling car with a bike, to tripling parking fees for massive SUVs and even banning cars in the city center altogether. At the same time, the city has made major investments in improving cycling infrastructure to increase safety and comfort for bike commuters.

The result has led to a massive drop in air pollution in the city, but it’s also changed the traffic equation over the years, making it much more friendly to navigate the city by bike, scooter, and walking.

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Now with the summer Olympics ready to kick off, Paris is kicking it into high gear. The city had already installed a wide network of protected bike lanes, but has now added another 60 km (37 miles) of those bike lanes to further connect specific Olympic sites. Bike lanes that directly connect between Olympic venues are painted pink to help tourists and residents alike find the best way to navigate toward the events.

The city has also installed 10,000 new bike racks to give riders a secure place to lock their bikes outside of Olympic venues, and the plan is to redistribute those racks around Paris after the Olympics are over.

Lime, the leading e-bike and e-scooter sharing service, has invested over 6 million euros in Paris ahead of the Olympics, ensuring it has enough of its shared electric bikes and the service to support them throughout the events. The company noted that it has already seen a major increase in the use of its shared electric bikes in the last few years as Paris has made impressive progress in growing its biking infrastructure via protected bike lanes and cycleway.

As Lime’s head of Global Policy Shari Shapiro explained of the city, “This is their signature moment; the whole world’s eyes are going to be on them. And they took this opportunity to say, ‘This is going to be a bikable event.’” 

via: Streetsblog