Only a limited facelift will take place before the Olympic Games. Co -piloting the project by the private thing is coughing on the left.
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After years of waiting, the Champs-Elysées will finally benefit from a first facelift. The work will start “in just a few weeks,” said Emmanuel Grégoire, Anne Hidalgo’s first assistant on Wednesday, May 11, on the occasion of the “official launch of the transformation” of the Parisian avenue. On the program: restoration of sidewalks and lampposts, harmonization of terraces, vegetation of tree feet, planting a hundred new shoots, but also reduction of space devolved to cars on the Place de l’Etoile. This work, in the amount of around 30 million euros, must be completed at the end of 2023. The city will finance the majority, but the Solido, the delivery company of the Olympic works, will pay its share, the urban sports events , fencing and taekwondo having to stand a place of Concorde and at the Grand Palais.
The real “metamorphosis” of the most famous avenue on the planet is not for tomorrow. “We are going to redo the place of Concorde before the Olympic Games [of 2024], then all of the avenue then”, had nevertheless promised M me hidalgo in the Sunday newspaper, in January 2021 . In reality, the redevelopment of the Concorde will only intervene after the games, like the rest of the Moulting of the Champs-Elysées in “extraordinary garden”. The renovation of the major axis which crosses the capital from east to west, from the Tuileries to the Arc de Triomphe, and extends to the defense, with its promises of trees and traffic reduction, joined Thus the list of major Parisian projects gradually offset, for lack of time, money or consensus. In the same way, the repair of the surroundings of the Eiffel Tower is likely to be postponed after 2024, the time to review the plans so as not to shoot down trees, as the town hall has just engaged.
The observation is however unanimous: the avenue of the Presidents of the Republic and luxury shops, of Godard and Zidane, “has lost a lot of its splendor in the last thirty years”, observes with spite , the mayor (Les Républicains) of 8 e arrondissement. The sidewalks are congested and the Place de la Concorde is difficult to cross for pedestrians. As for the bottom gardens, they are sorely lacking in charm and arrangements. Result: the millions of visitors who walk on the Champs-Elysées rarely prolong their wandering beyond Concorde, considered a lock. Those who come from the Louvre in the opposite direction are often stopped, too, in their journey. And the “most beautiful avenue in the world” is generally less frequented.
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