[jackjeff]

What is considered to be Paris (100km2) is a lot smaller than what people consider to be London (1500km2) or NYC (800km2 of land).

Yes. If you’re rich enough and can afford to live in Paris everything is about 15mins away.

If you leave “outside” then be ready for commutes that get proportionally cheaper as travel distance increase. A commute time of one hour or less is considered good. It’s not rare for people to commute for 2 hours or more, for each trip.

The problem is that the mayor of Paris is elected to represent the wishes of the privileged few that live in the center and cares little about commuters.

The anti-car attitude of the current Mayor (Mrs Hidalgo) reflects this. And if you look carefully at the data it looks like air pollution has reduced in areas where cars were removed but has increased elsewhere. It’s hardly a win for air pollution, but if you live in Paris the river side is now for pedestrians and not cars. So yeah. Real nice, if you can afford to live there.

[oska]

> And if you look carefully at the data it looks like air pollution has reduced in areas where cars were removed but has increased elsewhere.

Are you trying to imply some sort of causation here? Because I can't see how decreasing car use in the city centre would increase usage outside it.

> It’s hardly a win for air pollution

Decreasing the use of (internal combustion) cars in city centres is a huge win for air pollution as that is generally where traffic is most concentrated and thus air pollution levels are highest.

[jackjeff]

Car use in Paris has just shifted around. For it to disappear people would need credible alternatives. Remember most Parisians don’t have a cars and have fantastic public transport. It’s workers and commuters from far away that need vehicles.

Basically the river side used to be like a highway where you could travel from West to East and vice versa. This is essentially gone now. But all the traffic has moved more inland. So the pollution has reduced near the river, but increases on the East/West boulevards. It’s possible that traffic overall may have decreased, but the boulevards are full of intersection and traffic lights, whereas the river side highway was basically devoid of them. So overall for pollution, it’s really hard to see a win.

[oska]

Paris' greatest asset is its river, the Seine. Devoting a section of one of its two banks to a car highway is simply insane. If the city wants good uninterrupted travel East-West to replace that riverside highway it should build a tunnel.

[jackjeff]

It's obviously great if you live in Paris, especially when the weather is good. I have hanged out there many times in the summer even though I don't live in Paris anymore.

But if you're one of these commuters who has to drive, and use that specific east/west route, then it's an every day annoyance. You're reminded at every traffic light that your commute has increased by X minutes.

I think the solution is obviously to improve the public transport situation especially for far-away suburbs. But it's hard. It costs a lot, there are political animosities at play, and fundamentally Paris citizens do not really suffer from car commute issues since they don't need cars.

[hk__2]

> It’s workers and commuters from far away that need vehicles.

They need vehicles to reach the public transports, not to move around in Paris.

[CalRobert]

Do you have a source?

[jackjeff]

https://www.airparif.asso.fr/actualite/detail/id/213

[xkcd-sucks]

Car emissions are negligible compared to scooter emissions though

[dehrmann]

> a lot smaller than what people consider to be London

Is somewhere like Westminster technically London? It's definitely what people consider to be London, and it's within Greater London, but as a political entity, it is its own city.