Paris has promised to shake up the way the Olympics are held, but it will come at the cost of some disruption for itself too.
The image is surreal. The Avenue des Champs-Élysées has been emptied of cars for hundreds of meters, from the Place de la Concorde towards the Arc de Triomphe. Only a few rare vehicles and cyclists still walk there, the other people walking there do so on foot. “It looks like the weeks when there was COVID,” a passerby whispers to her companion.
The scene is repeated on the Rue de Rivoli, along the Louvre Museum. A couple of tourists have sat down at a deserted terrace and are trying, as best they can, to enjoy their moment in the city of love by contemplating the museum through the two high metal fences that line the street.
This is because the two lovers are in a red zone, where motor vehicles are prohibited, with rare exceptions – but to which pedestrians and cyclists have free access – and that the Louvre, because it borders the Seine, where the opening ceremony will take place on Friday, is in a gray zone, where even pedestrians and cyclists are excluded, unless they have a “Games Pass” with “a QR code” as residents or an entry ticket on the day of the event.
This system of anti-terrorist protection perimeters, which has been active since July 18, also comes with a black zone, where one is exposed to a personal search, and a blue zone, whose rules are a little less severe with regard to vehicles. It was made necessary in particular by the desire of the organizers to hold the Games as close as possible to the population. Indeed, several competition sites are located in the heart of the city, and the opening ceremony will be held for the first time outside a stadium.
This opening ceremony alone and the cycling races that will later pass through the city’s streets will require the use of 44,000 security barriers. Although the Games organizers are counting heavily on public transport to reduce the event’s carbon footprint, they will be forced to close the metro stations that will be in the gray zones. There will be 27 of them on Friday night.
Where did all these people go?
All this is usually done in good spirits, but it is not uncommon for the walker passing near the main competition sites to no longer know how to go or where. This was particularly the case for the many visitors who wanted to climb the Eiffel Tower or just see it up close.
More than twenty tourist sites are subject to exceptional security measures. This is the case in particular for the Eiffel Tower and the Louvre Museum, which will keep their doors open during the Games, but which the public will only be able to access with a reservation. This will also be the case at the Musée d’Orsay, where visitors seemed to be relatively few in number early Wednesday afternoon.
This is not the only place where, at the end of July, one has the impression that there are abnormally few people in the French metropolis, which is also the world capital of tourism.
The restrictions on car traffic are unlikely to have much of an impact on Parisians. Barely 5% of trips are normally made by car or motorized two-wheeler in the city center, according to a recent study, compared to more than 11% by bike, 30% by public transport and more than 50% on foot.
As for tourists, one might intuitively have thought that holding the Games would attract more, not fewer. But it’s not that simple, explains Eric Brunelle, professor and director of the Pôle sports at HEC Montréal. Since cities’ reception capacities cannot increase that much and what attracts some can scare away others, we usually observe a replacement phenomenon, “where we will see tourists who are indeed attracted by the Olympic Games, but others, who might have come otherwise, put it off until another time.”
From the Halles to the Luxembourg Gardens
The same sense of calm was felt in the Halles district. “Things are going slowly, very slowly,” said yesterday the man who runs the small counter where you can buy Nutella crepes next to the Pompidou Center. “The Parisians have already gone on vacation and the tourists haven’t really arrived yet. We’ll see if things will eventually improve.”
It might have seemed like there were more people on the forecourt of Notre-Dame Cathedral, but that was probably because of the limited space left between the security fences. “We don’t have many visitors,” confirms Mohamed, who is in charge of reception at the crypt.
Ronny experienced a double disappointment. He and his family learned on site that the cathedral had still not reopened since the terrible fire of 2019, and they were not even able to get as close as they would have liked because they did not have the necessary “QR code”. “I understand. They are right to be cautious. But it is disappointing,” the young father from Arizona insisted in French, before explaining the situation to his little family in English.
It was a little livelier at the end of Boulevard Saint-Michel, in the Jardin du Luxembourg. There were even a good ten small sailboats in the basin, and most of the iron chairs were occupied by visitors resting their feet and workers having lunch.
A couple in their sixties were sunbathing next to a statue, he with the air of a university professor and she both distinguished and relaxed. “I wasn’t particularly in favor of the Games in Paris, but I’m not against it today. It should still be a great event,” said Hubert, who has lived in Paris “forever.” “It’s the fault of these elections we just had. They’ve dampened the mood,” added Claire.