First the 15mins walk thing is probably already true in most district in Paris. But what you do not realize is that only a tiny minority of privileged people can actually afford to live in Paris. It's a bit like if the right of vote was restricted to people with high income.
Paris is TINY. Paris is SMALLER than the borough of Brooklyn in NYC.
Paris is 3x smaller than just the inner boroughs of London and 16x smaller than London.
The Paris business district (La Défense) is actually located OUTSIDE Paris. The business district spreads across 4 different municipalities!
Even if Paris fused with all the neighboring counties (92, 93 and 94) it would still be smaller than London.
Because of political concerns any project that would benefit commuters just takes forever.
> But what you do not realize is that only a tiny minority of privileged people can actually afford to live in Paris. It's a bit like if the right of vote was restricted to people with high income.
This not even a bit like that. The right to vote is restricted to the people who live there, whether they are rich or poor. Also, it’s far from a minority: with 2M+ inhabitants, that’s the largest city in France: 2x Marseille, 4x Lyon, it has the same population as the four next most populated cities (Lyon, Marseille, Toulouse, and Nice) combined. If e.g. the 11th arrondissement would be a city it‘d be in the top 10 in France by population.
While there is nothing illogical about it there is more to a city than just the people who live in it. Millions of people live in a suburb and commute to work in a larger city. Their employer pays taxes in that city. The employees eat lunch in that city. The city may be a tourist destination (Paris certainly is)
Of course, and improving the lives of those people is important but should never be detrimental to the Parisians themselves. For example, tourism means lots of Airbnb’d flats that are thus taken away from the people who could live there, and higher rents for those who can.
Your comment seems highly tone-deaf. Look at some of the comments above about pollution and what it has done to areas immediately outside of the city core.
The air quality in Paris has significantly improved over the past few years, thanks to multiple initiatives to reduce the car traffic, both at the city and regional level [1].
Some of the places where it got worse are far away from Paris… so who cares about the poor people who live in a far-away suburb near the freeway. It's not like they vote for Paris' mayor.
I live in a high-tourism city that is not Paris and AirBNB severely reducing the amount of housing on the market is definitely a problem that high-tourism cities are having.
Paris is TINY. Paris is SMALLER than the borough of Brooklyn in NYC.
Paris is 3x smaller than just the inner boroughs of London and 16x smaller than London.
The Paris business district (La Défense) is actually located OUTSIDE Paris. The business district spreads across 4 different municipalities!
Even if Paris fused with all the neighboring counties (92, 93 and 94) it would still be smaller than London.
Because of political concerns any project that would benefit commuters just takes forever.