Over the past two decades, Paris has been evolving into a greener and more biodiverse city.
As cities worldwide are expected to accommodate 70% of their populations, Paris has embraced sustainability and environmentally friendly practices in its urban development.
Since Anne Hidalgo was elected mayor of Paris in 2014, the first woman to hold the office, she has been on a mission to reinvent the city as a green metropolis.
Mayor Hidalgo created a series of policies and initiatives to encourage green investment in the city, improve pedestrian infrastructure, and reduce the urban heat island (UHI) effect by creating climate shelters and introducing a mobile app that monitors thermal comfort in the city.
Due to these policies, she is also credited with reducing Paris’s carbon emissions by 40% in ten years and plays a key role in advancing the 15-minute city urban design.
On December 14, 2023, Mayor Hidalgo was selected as the recipient of the Urban Land Institute (ULI) Prize for Visionaries in Urban Development, the most prestigious and respected honor in the global land use and development community.
“Working with a diverse group of public and private sector experts as well as engaged residents of Paris, we have created a city that translates this vision into reality. Together, we’ve championed initiatives to enhance walkability, diminish reliance on automobiles, and fortify our commitment to fostering sustainable communities both within and beyond the city limits,” Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo says in response to the ULI prize.
“This recognition serves as a testament to the collective efforts that have propelled Paris towards a more inclusive, resilient, and sustainable urban landscape,” she adds.
Among her many green and sustainable initiatives in the French capital are closing one side of the street to motor vehicles along the Seine River. The river quickly became a social hub for residents, transforming the area into a makeshift beach in the summer, along with floating pools installed on the river.
Mayor Hidalgo also seeks to increase the number of affordable housing units that enter the market each year, limiting the height of new buildings in Paris to 37 meters or 12 stories.
The city’s latest green initiative is removing 60,000 parking spaces and replacing them with trees. This action is one of the goals outlined in Paris’s 2024-2030 Climate Plan, which was released in early November 2024 and will yet to be voted on by the Council of Paris.
The “Faster, Fairer, More Local” plan pledges to deliver a greener, more resilient against extreme weather, more pedestrian-friendly, less car-dependent city. Reaching this goal involves establishing 300 hectares of new green space by 2030, reaching 10% by 2026.
Curbsides along the streets will be planted with trees, which will also help manage stormwater absorption. The recent heat waves exposed the city’s vulnerability to rising temperatures, worsened by the urban heat island (UHI) effect and aggravated by many homes and businesses without air conditioning.
The city plans to create “oasis squares” in Paris’s 20 arrondissements or districts to address the impacts of heat waves and rising temperatures. These areas will be planted with trees and built with shade structures to offer residents respite from the heat and help lower the surrounding temperatures.
The city’s other climate adaptation strategies include establishing more neighborhood cooling centers and installing “cool roofs” on 1,000 buildings. Cool roofs are either insulated or painted white to reflect sunlight.
Additionally, the city has expanded the number of car-free areas, with one set up in each arrondissement. On the Boulevard Périphérique, Paris’s notorious inner beltway, the city plans to dedicate a traffic lane for public transit vehicles and carpoolers.
The remaining open lanes will have a reduced speed limit of 50 km per hour. Paris’s ongoing environmental challenges, including heat waves, floods, biodiversity loss, increasing water scarcity, and air pollution, have led the city to adopt a sustainable approach incorporating nature-based solutions to address these problems.
The increasing demand for new buildings and infrastructure that comes with urbanization impacts the environment locally and globally. Construction materials like steel and cement are carbon-intensive and account for 11% of energy and process-related carbon emissions.
Transforming green areas into paved and built-up areas also increases cities’ and residents’ vulnerability to health and climate-related threats like floods and the UHI effect (van Oorshot et al., 2024).
Climate change and urbanization are driving the need for a shift in how we approach environmental challenges and urban planning and adopt sustainable solutions. Traditional approaches—often focused on engineering and complex infrastructure – can no longer address today’s complex environmental challenges.
Cities are increasingly turning to nature-based solutions and applying them in combination with the traditional infrastructure – “gray” to harness the efficiency and benefits of both (green and gray) solutions.
Paris is a prime example of incorporating nature-based solutions into urban planning and development. It effectively addresses the challenges posed by climate change, urbanization, and the necessity of protecting and preserving the city’s ecosystem.
Studies indicate that hybrid solutions—combining green and gray infrastructure—reduce the risks associated with natural hazards and extreme weather events and provide essential co-benefits beyond risk reduction and mitigation.
These benefits include environmental regulation and preservation, effective stormwater management, improved soil quality, reduced noise levels, lower air temperatures, and provision of essential resources like food and fresh water.
Sources:
Poon, L. (2024, November 19). Paris to Replace Parking With Trees in New Climate Plan. Bloomberg. Retrieved from https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2024-11-18/paris-to-replace-parking-with-trees-in-new-climate-plan-citylab-daily?srnd=homepage-middle-east
Florian, M. (2023, December 15). Anne Hidalgo, the Mayor of Paris, Wins the 2023 ULI Prize for Visionaries in Urban Development. Retrieved from https://www.archdaily.com/1011176/anne-hidalgo-the-mayor-of-paris-wins-the-2023-uli-prize-for-visionaries-in-urban-development
Fertita, E. (2023, December 14). Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo Named Winner of 2023 ULI Prize For Visionaries in Urban Development. ULI Americas. Retrieved from https://americas.uli.org/uli-prize-2023-mayor-anne-hidalgo/?utm_medium=website&utm_source=archdaily.com
Greening Paris. (2024, June 19). IUCN. Retrieved from https://iucn.org/story/202406/greening-paris
Paris to plant first ‘urban forest’ on busy roundabout in drive to build a garden city. (2023, December 7). Reuters. Retrieved from https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/paris-plant-first-urban-forest-busy-roundabout-drive-build-garden-city-2023-12-06/
Anderson, C., Renaud, F., Hanscomb, S., Ollauri, A. (2022, May 15). Green, hybrid, or grey disaster risk reduction measures: What shapes public preferences for nature-based solutions? Journal of Environmental Management. Retrieved from https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301479722003000
van Oorschot, J., Slootweg, M., Remme, R.P. et al. Optimizing green and gray infrastructure planning for sustainable urban development. npj Urban Sustain 4, 41 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42949-024-00178-5
Leave a Reply