The transformation of the Paris ring-road, the Boulevard Périphérique, will accelerate during 2024 and 2025 with the conversion of city gateways - Portes - into squares, such as Porte Maillot and Porte de la Chapelle, the opening of the Olympic Lane, the reduction of the speed limit to 50 km/h, the construction of new facilities, the creation of new parks in the Green Belt, the planting of more than 50,000 trees in 4 years. This Atlas maps these urban transformations and the evolution of mobility and traffic for the months of October and November 2024 compared with 2023, in order to measure their impact on neighbourhoods in municipalities bordering the infrastructure.
The transformations of the Boulevard Périphérique and Green Belt have been documented by Apur for many years in a partnership approach, particularly through workshops which led to the "Livre Blanc du Boulevard Périphérique". These workshops, organised by the City of Paris since 2019, have brought together the neighbouring local authorities, territories, the Greater Paris - Grand Paris Metropolis -, administrative Departments, the French government, Airparif and Bruitparif.
Among the shared initiatives, there are notably short term proposals such as planting trees, the transformation of city gateways into squares, lowering the speed limit and establishing a VR2+ lane, devoted to certain vehicles, e.g. carrying two or more people, as a legacy of the Olympic Lane.
To assess the impact of these measures, the Agency has been associated since the first quarter of 2024 with the VR2+ Reserved Lane Observatory, with the social and economic aspects put in place over the past 5 years by the City of Paris, as well as with the Cerema.
Within a 500-metre radius each side of the infrastructure, the Boulevard Périphérique's neighbouring areas form a territory where 597,608 people live, and whose population has grown since 2014 (+3%). This densely populated area of Grand Paris Metropolis includes 323,000 homes of which 111,500 are social housing. There are 22 QPV neighbourhoods of the City's Social Cohesion Policy - Politique de la Ville - and is being reinvented within sixty or so project sectors. It is home to 374,223 salaried jobs, 429 sports facilities, 545 schools and crèches, 140 higher education establishments, 93 student residences and 23,000 rooms in 180 tourist accommodation establishments.
Since the speed limit on the Boulevard Périphérique was lowered to 50 km/h, which came into effect on 1st October 2024, Apur has been working with the City of Paris Department of Roads and Mobility in liaison with the Department of The Ecology and Climate Transition, to analyse the evolution of traffic and noise pollution in the immediate vicinity of the Boulevard Périphérique.
As complementary to the weekly Périphérique Bulletin published by the City of Paris, this document proposes a spacialised presentation of traffic trends on the Boulevard Périphérique using the 5 indicators found in the monthly bulletin (traffic, congestion, accidents, noise pollution and air quality). A dozen or so key maps serve as a reminder of the urban framework of the Boulevard Périphérique and Green Belt.
October and November were the first two, complete months of the Boulevard Périphérique operating at the reduced speed limit of 50 km/h. The detailed analyses enable the initial results to be mapped for each section (of variable distances from 250 to 600 metres) over a 5 week period, and show the changing dynamics compared with 2023.
The spacial analysis of the 50 km/h speed limit in operation reveals 4 consequences in particular:
- With a practically identical flow of vehicles in October-November 2023 and 2024, the congestion level was considerably lower (-20%).
- The number of accidents reduced significantly with 298 accidents in October-November 2024 compared with 369 in 2023.
- Noise pollution, particularly at night, also fell. Along the Porte de Vincennes section of the Boulevard Périphérique, a reduction of -3.1dB(A) was measured between October 2023 and 2024, 79.8 and 76.7 dB(A) respectively.
- Although measuring NO2 and PM10 emissions is a complex process, implying the interlinking of different and particularly climatic factors, the months of October-November 2024 revealed a reduction in these concentrated emissions of -13% NO2 and -24% PM10.
This first Atlas of "Following Developments along the Boulevard Périphérique and in Green Belt Neighbourhoods" reveals, through 8 indicators (day and night speed, traffic, congestion, accidents, air NO2, PM10, noise), the first comparative trends of the impact of the 50 km/h speed limit. It also shows the major urban transformations undertaken by all the infrastructure's local municipalities since the Boulevard Périphérique Workshops.
