Four years of work
The local bioclimatic urban planning plan (PLUb) will guide the major development guidelines and regulate all construction in the city over the next 20 to 25 years. The last one dates back to 2006.
"The challenge is to be able to continue living in Paris given the evolution of the climate and the real estate market," Anne Hidalgo, the socialist mayor of the capital, which has been losing an average of 10.000 inhabitants per year for the past ten years, summed up to AFP.
The result of four years of work, the PLU was the subject of tough negotiations within the majority of Anne Hidalgo and her former deputy for urban planning Emmanuel Grégoire, who became a member of parliament and declared candidate for the 2026 municipal elections.
In the agreement concluded in 2023, environmentalists obtained, in particular, the limitation of high-rise towers.
Climate emergency
Greening, eco-construction, rehabilitation... The PLU "thinks about the building of tomorrow so that it participates in the effort to breathe and refresh" the capital, explains Lamia El Aaraje, the current deputy mayor for urban planning.
"Do we accept that tomorrow the climate will be the same in Paris as in Seville? That a temperature reading taken this summer on the roof of the Climate Academy showed 60 degrees and 57 degrees on the floor below? Who will be able to live there?" asks the socialist elected official.
The question of greening Parisian roofs, including historic zinc roofs, will be, according to her, "fundamental" and will not fail to cause debate among heritage defenders.
Key measure of the PLU: the creation of 300 hectares of new green spaces open to the public.
"It's not going to be easy, but we absolutely have to create them" to reach the 10 square metres of green spaces per inhabitant recommended by the WHO, stresses environmentalist Corine Faugeron.
The opposition considers this objective "unrealistic" and denounces the policy of "concreting" the municipality in the densest capital in Europe.
40% of public spaces will also have to be de-impermeable by 2050 to avoid devastating floods such as those in the Valencia region of Spain.
More "affordable" housing, fewer offices
To "preserve social diversity", the PLU aims for "40% public housing (social and intermediate, Editor's note) by 2035", explains Senator Ian Brossat, co-president of the communist group on the Paris Council.
The PLU creates areas of "major social housing deficit", when they are below the 10% threshold, to correct the imbalance between the west and east of the capital. As soon as a developer builds 500 m2 there, he will have to reserve half of it for social housing.
Around 800 addresses have been reserved via a system called pastillage: a building permit filed for a building will only be validated if it is transformed into a social housing building.
"We have been campaigning extensively in the central business district to encourage the transformation of offices," adds Ian Brossat.
These guidelines are strongly criticized by the opposition, which fears "pressure" on building owners. The right also denounces an "imbalance" between private housing and social housing, "while income gaps continue to widen, pushing families into exile," deplores Geoffroy Boulard (LR), one of the leaders of the first opposition group, Union Capitale.
Rachida Dati's Changer Paris group is calling for the creation of a "private housing deficit zone".
"Quarter-hour city"
The city hall promises new "essential" facilities "less than fifteen minutes' walk from home", in the spirit of the "15-minute city" conceived by urban planner Carlos Moreno: new health centres, new gyms and swimming pools, and a "green and sports belt" around the ring road. This should help to respond to the enthusiasm generated by the Olympic Games for sports.
The PLU aims to preserve 61.000 businesses, with 323 km of protected linear spaces for local businesses, 29 km for craft businesses and 9 km for cultural businesses.