(Paris) The Eiffel Tower will remain closed again on Tuesday, for the second consecutive day, due to a strike launched by unions denouncing the management of the most famous site in Paris, we learned from a union source.
The Paris town hall, the main shareholder of the Société d’exploitation de la Tour Eiffel (SETE), “refuses to negotiate for the moment,” a representative of the CGT union told AFP.
Since Monday, the closure has aroused the frustration of thousands of visitors, mainly foreigners – around 80% according to 2023 statistics –.
Five months before the Paris Olympic Games (July 26 – August 11), the unions want to force the town hall to change a model that they consider “untenable” for the SETE.
They had already launched a strike leading to the closure of the “Iron Lady” on December 27, the hundredth anniversary of the disappearance of its builder Gustave Eiffel.
The unions criticize the town hall for “seeking profitability at all costs and in the short term” and ask it to “ensure the sustainability of the monument and the company that manages it”.
The economic balance of the Eiffel Tower, which in 2023 returned to higher attendance than it was before COVID-19, with 6.3 million visitors, was weakened by some 120 million euros in shortfalls. win during the two years of health crisis (2020 and 2021).
To cope, SETE was recapitalized to the tune of 60 million euros in 2021. But to the loss of revenue was added an equivalent additional bill – around 130 million euros – for additional costs of renovation work, mainly linked to the current painting campaign, complicated by the discovery of traces of lead.