Figure 32 - Various Strategic projects scheduled till 2030 in Greater Paris region

Figure 32 - Various Strategic projects scheduled till 2030 in Greater Paris region (Source: Paris Region Institute, 2019)

through national and regional funding procedures in the inner neighbourhood ring (See figure 32) These projects are intended to generate new high density urbanization in vicinity to the surrounding stations of the new metro line in order to reduce territorial inequality, reinforce greater Paris attractiveness and add housing stock capacity to the already full city (Bouard & Carriere, 2019). The supporting elements to achieve the target of dense development include (Barbé, 2014) • Limitation of urban extension through strict regional planning regulations • Regeneration of former industrial zones into mixed use areas • Densification of traditional urban neighbourhoods For the inner-city area, since high building density already exists which allows economically justified decentralization of services and provision of amenities, the Paris En Commun strategy with respect to 15 minute city access can be said to be focussing on: 1. Further Intensification of the neighbourhoods to mix housing with shops, entertainment with open spaces, offices with educational buildings etc (Pozoukidou & Chatziyiannaki, 2021, p. 17), 2. Sustainable transport, pedestrianization of city urban spaces, adding greenways and parks which shall serve as multi-purpose recreation spaces with amenities like open gyms, community gardening (Emery & Thrift, 2021; Gorman & Dillon-robinson, 2021; Pozoukidou & Chatziyiannaki, 2021) 3. Liveability programs and improving access through time-based policies 4. Equity based policies and programs (equity of health services, housing) These four analysed domains of ‘15-minute city access’ are elaborated below.

1.Intensification of Neighbourhoods

Paris En Commun relies on participatory budgeting and community engagement to identify the needs of the community in individual neighbourhoods and what services need to be provided. The residents can participate in the selection and design of projects to be implemented in the area. For the provision of amenities various programmes have been adopted, viz, • A semi-public company called ‘Semaest’ is established whose role is buy, `through its ‘pre-emptive’ right, the ground floor spaces in the city with the purpose of retail and commerce. These spaces shall be activated by inviting local businesses and economic actors to introduce services like doctors, cultural places, associations and resource centers and solidarity canteens in the neighbourhoods. (Emery & Thrift, 2021; Paris En Commun, 2019, p. 7; Pisano, 2020) • Furthermore, in order to promote ground floor shops (Read local shops), zoning codes have been updated, while local production is supported through the ‘Made in Paris’ campaign (Paris En Commun, 2019). Hybrid spaces like co-working spaces and fab labs have been installed in some neighbourhoods already since 2016 and ongoing. • In neighbourhoods and monofunctional areas where ground floor active usage is limited, for example in social housing neighbourhoods (built in modernist era) and urban job clusters such as La Defense, pop-up markets are promoted which provide access to recreation activities, local food, mobile libraries, etc. (L’institut Paris

Region, 2018; Paris En Commun, 2019). The city intends to promote localisation of cafés, restaurants, and full-service grocery stores near university areas to provide access to healthy food and reduce trips. • Co-Location strategy has been adopted to add inter-related and complementary services close to each other and promoting hybrid shops (for example, bike repairing and library facilities in a single space) to enhance access to basic services. Such spaces provide economic justification of service provision in limited ground floor areas and low-density areas. (L’institut Paris Region, 2018)

2.Sustainable transport and greening of neighbourhood and city:

Walking is prioritised in the city coupled with sustainable transport modes. The proposal includes intensification of public transport in areas less served and increasing pedestrian access through increasing bike lanes and pedestrian pathways. Access to parks and gardens shall be increase by provision of greenways and temporary as well as permanent bike lanes as per the context and priority (Paris En Commun, 2019). The city intends to invest 300 million euros for bike lanes and improving existing routes. Street parking has been converted into parklets, parking slots have been added with bike parking options and pooled parking priority over private car parking. During the pandemic more than 50 km of temporary bike routes were added to the city (Global mayors COVID-19 recovery task force, 2020) and by 2024, as part of the Paris resilience strategy, every street in the Paris region should have a separate bike and pedestrian lane. (Office of the Mayor of Paris, 2018, p. 14) School are the focal point of fifteen minute neighbourhoods (Paris En Commun, 2019). Through the children streets program, the school access streets shall be pedestrianised during school rush hours. The pedestrianization in the city is coupled with greening initiatives. For example, through the ‘Oasis program’ school premises are being transformed into community gardens access to public in off school hours thus providing access to greens (Paris En Commun, 2019). The city plans to create new ‘urban forests’ of various scales (Office of the Mayor of Paris, 2018) through greening arterial roads, street beautification projects, squares and gardens. Other greening initiatives include incentivising citizens for greening the private roof areas and allowing residents to garden anywhere within the city limits (Arnarsdóttir, 2020; Reimer, 2020)

3.Liveability programs and time-based policies

Under the FMC concept, each neighbourhood shall be added with public authority owned citizen kiosks to function as gathering place, information dispersal, neighbourhood services enquiry, to get daily assistance like key-drop etc. (Paris En Commun, 2019). Emphasising time as an important element of urban poverty, the city has launched flexible city program (Gorman & Dillon-robinson, 2021, p. 65) though which various ‘time based policies’ (Charbgoo & Mareggi, 2018) are promoted. Some of which include increasing nite bus services, opening up school playgrounds on weekends and holidays to general public, temporary limits on cars in the arterial roads on Sundays and extending public library hours (Paris En Commun, 2019).

4.Equity based policies and programs

The Paris En Commun strategy lays emphasis on under-represented communities in the neighbourhoods. Special program are put in place to include ethnic, LGBTQ and homeless communities in planning processes. The program aspires to convert 30% of its housing stock in the city into public domain by 2029 (Rolland, 2020 as cited in Sisson, 2020) The new housing stock shall be informed by inclusionary zoning standards, i.e mixed use, built to edge with active ground floors and variety of housing options to accommodate different type of users. Solidarity canteens and storage shops have been planned in each arrondissement to increase the liveability of homeless people (Paris En Commun, 2019)

Governance of 15-minute city

An office for 15-minute city is setup to coordinate the related efforts by different departments and co-ordination of various provisions across neighbourhoods (Nieuwenhuijsen, 2020). The local administration suggests that priority plan is well in place where the third places like co-working hubs and fab labs shall be added to neighbourhoods where there are none (Rolland, 2020 as cited in Sisson, 2020).

The city has adopted participatory budgeting in each neighbourhood since 2014, which allows decentralization of decision making power close to people through public representatives of the neighbourhood (Pozoukidou & Chatziyiannaki, 2021).