The High Commission for Strategy and Planning proposes breaking up the Greater Paris Metropolis in favor of a capital city of 7 million inhabitants.

"While the concrete Greater Paris is developing, institutionally the capital remains trapped within its 19th-century borders," note the authors of this report, including Clément Beaune.

The idea is to take the capital out of its perimeter wall, the "périph", to create a city of Greater Paris and abolish the Metropolis of Greater Paris (MGP), a community created in 2016 which brings together 130 municipalities for 7,2 million inhabitants.

"Such a change requires a national choice, a strong involvement of the State, because it concerns all of France. It must therefore be prepared, nurtured and debated, in advance of the 2027 elections," argues Clément Beaune.

The administrative organization of the Paris agglomeration, "unique in Europe, no longer coincides with the realities of the territories encompassed," the note states.

Despite a significant increase in population in the inner suburbs and a decrease in the number of inhabitants in its city centre, Paris "has not experienced any major changes to its administrative boundaries" since a law of June 1859 which created the current twenty arrondissements.

"The conurbation continues to develop, around a ring road still perceived since its inauguration in 1973 as a true border within a territory that is being reconfigured to (re)find its unity," the note continues.

To remedy this, "institutional simplification" is needed, which would involve "the creation of the City of Greater Paris", a merger of Paris with the departments and municipalities of the inner suburbs, resulting in a single territorial authority.

This would include the elimination of the departments (92, 93, 94) and the municipalities of the inner suburbs, as well as the Greater Paris metropolis.

According to projections by the High Commission, the merger of these levels with the City of Paris would lead to the creation of a new local authority with special status, which would be organized into forty new districts.

The key is a "simplification" of both the "current complex structure of the inner suburbs of Paris" and "the skills currently fragmented between town halls, departments, inter-municipalities, MGP and Region".

The MGP has expertise in the areas of metropolitan spatial planning, economic development, local housing policy, ecological transition, and the management of aquatic environments and flood prevention.

Illustrative image of the article via Depositphotos.com.