The Trocadéro greening project at Anne Hidalgo's Eiffel Tower is not yet finalized according to the police prefect

Police prefect Laurent Nuñez said Tuesday that he “still has questions” about the latest version of the project defended by Anne Hidalgo for the revegetation and pedestrianization of the perspective between Trocadéro and the Eiffel Tower. A previous copy presented by the town hall was blocked by the prefecture in 2022.

The project called One planned for the 2024 Olympics the closure to traffic on half of the Place du Trocadéro, transformed into a green theater, as well as the pedestrianization of the Iéna bridge planted with trees and the repair of the Champ-de -March, with the installation of a locker at the foot of the Eiffel Tower. But since then, the issue has gone from disappointment to disappointment: health crisis, revolt from local residents and the three right-wing district mayors concerned, including Rachida Dati at the head of the 7th arrondissement, controversy over the trees felled at the foot of the Eiffel Tower and veto of the previous police prefect Didier Lallement.

“As I speak to you, there are still questions (...) on several points,” explained to the Paris Council the current prefect of police Laurent Nunez, who intervened during a wish from the Parisian executive aimed at to relaunch this contested project “from October”.

“First, the project as it is presented to my services (...) is not quite the same as that which we had previously examined”, with “a certain number of roads, avenues whose direction of traffic may have changed” or “a cycle path which was not planned”, he detailed.

The “second subject” is that the traffic study that he received at the end of 2023 from the town hall “suggests that we still have, on certain axes (...) important for the circulation of vehicles of relief and health, embarrassments", notably "the Pont de l'Alma, the Concorde, Avenue Mandel". “All this justifies that we are still working on this project,” he added.

In May 2022, the previous prefect Didier Lallement vetoed the “One” project, fearing “significant traffic delays” and “detentions” likely to hamper emergency services. Seized by the city, administrative justice then ruled in favor of the State, at first instance then on appeal. “As the case stands, the police prefect is not led to reconsider the position that was expressed,” summarized Laurent Nuñez.

Rejected by administrative justice at the end of 2022 then at the beginning of 2023 on appeal, the town hall concluded that the project “was not intended to be implemented as such”, as recognized by the first deputy Emmanuel Grégoire on Tuesday morning. But the Olympic Games offer Anne Hidalgo a new window of opportunity: at the Trocadéro, a “tower for broadcasting television images will help to reduce the space for cars,” she stressed at the Paris Council. The town hall therefore re-released the file in “a modified form submitted to the police headquarters”, explained Emmanuel Grégoire. The left-wing executive is now calling for the “pedestrianization and revegetation of the Place du Trocadéro and the Pont d’Iéna” alone, without the Eiffel Tower and the Champ-de-Mars, and this “from the month of October”.

The new Minister of Culture Rachida Dati, from LR and Parisian opponent of Anne Hidalgo, denounced a new “coup de force” while the project seemed “abandoned”. The state representative, however, was open to a review, based on the technical documents promised by the town hall. These will be transmitted “very quickly”, assured Anne Hidalgo, eager to be able to “move forward on this fundamental project”.