Paris 15-Minute City 📍 paris, france

The 15-minute City: a new urban model. LSE Event, (2022).

Author: Tess Tjokrodikromo (TNO), Nayla Saniour (UPM), Maiara Biscaro Uliana (TNO)

How can a city transform itself to become more environmental friendly and socially inclusive?

15-Minute City is an urban plan established by the city of Paris whose goal is to make most daily necessities accomplishable by either walking or cycling from residents' homes in a maximum of 15 minutes.

Paris is committed to creating a city, or rather a multitude of neighbourhoods within the city, that will put people at the centre. The 15-minute city started as one of the drivers in Anne Hidalgo’s (Mayor of Paris) re-election campaign. The project started in 2020 and is expected to take six years.

Mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo took her bicycle out on the streets to promote her vision on the 15-minute city during the 2020 mayoral elections. Under Mayor Anne Hidalgo’s aim for ‘La Ville Du Quart d’Heure’ (the quarter-hour city), Paris is now focusing on developing new services for each district. A new economic model for local businesses, reducing traffic and reclaiming streets as bike lanes and areas for leisure, and transforming existing infrastructure are on top of the list.

The goal of 15-Minute City is a more environmentally friendly and socially inclusive urban (sub)development, which should make urban life more qualitative, agile, healthy and flexible. The 15-Minute City also provides a framework to accelerate the path to carbon-free cities. It focuses on integrating land use and transport planning and is most successful when implemented as part of a citywide, city-led strategy that strongly involves local people.

The main enabler of the 15-minute city concept in Paris is the political commitment by the mayor. Because the concept is part of her agenda it receives funding and support.

Furthermore, the worldwide COVID-19 pandemic revealed weaknesses in urban planning that had previously been overlooked. This finding accelerated the consideration and implementation of the 15-Minute City concept in response to the climate crisis and urban impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic. The restricted radius of movement led to an increased relevance of quality in one‘s own neighbourhood. In this respect, the 15-Minute approach is an attempt to bring the built environment more in line with the people living there.

Proponents of the concept urge those investments under the 15-Minute City paradigm should be targeted to lower-income neighbourhoods. This includes measures such as implementing inclusive spatial planning/zoning, affordable housing, and supporting collaborative and community based approaches to housing development (e.g., cooperative housing). Urban planning interventions must be understood and implemented hand-in-hand with socially inclusive development processes.

Spatial distances between living, working, (local) supplies, services, leisure, and educational facilities should be kept short so that the need for transport is reduced and traffic is avoided. The strong focus on spatial proximity is mainly criticized because it promotes gentrification which leads to increasing segregation and isolation of neighbourhoods.