In the district of Pigalle, in Paris, it has become a habit. A tourist bus parks in double line near the Moulin-Rouge, while its occupants, most often foreigners, pose for a hasty selfie in front of the famous cabaret. Hurry up. It must be said that the driver of the vehicle is in violation: in the capital, coaches cannot park anywhere. There are reserved areas, highly regulated and distributed throughout the Parisian territory. We are talking here about “deposit” or “recovery” areas. But these perimeters are doomed to disappear, because, for a few years, the mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, has declared war on the tourist buses which abound in the capital.
From 2019, his first deputy, Emmanuel Grégoire, declared: “Cars are no longer welcome in the hypercentre.” By 2030, no more diesel vehicles will be able to circulate in Greater Paris. This ban was originally supposed to take place in 2024, for the Olympic Games, but the town hall of Paris continues to postpone the deadline. For professionals in the sector, the blow is tough. “More than 80% of the fleet runs on diesel. There are currently no electric coaches capable of driving for 900 kilometers, this will raise real questions”, recognizes Frédéric Hocquard, deputy mayor of Paris in charge of tourism, which seems to underestimate the problem. In reality, the share of diesel is even greater.
An almost exclusively diesel fleet
“To put it very clearly: today you have just over 66,600 coaches in France, of which more than 65,000 are still diesel vehicles”, specifies Jean-Sébastien Barrault, president of the National Federation of Passenger Transport. (FNTV). The transition to more sustainable models will in any case have to be done at a forced pace.
In Paris, electric buses are already running on the RATP network, but when it comes to coaches, that’s another story. “For buses, these are models that should prevail in the future, their current autonomy being generally sufficient for the distances to be covered, and this meets the requirements in terms of pollution and low emission zones. [ZFE]. For coaches, a bit like for heavy goods vehicles, there is more uncertainty, because battery-powered electricity becomes less suitable when the distances get longer”, explains Aurélien Bigo, researcher associated with the energy and prosperity chair of the Louis-Bachelier Institute and specialist in the decarbonation of transport.
Currently, the industrial offer in this area is very weak. BYD, Chinese car giant, which is trying to establish itself in France, produces for example an electric car, but its autonomy is currently capped at 200 kilometers. “Vehicle offers, especially electric or hydrogen, are not very developed in the short term, and I imagine that there are not yet specific models for tour operators. For the options of liquid fuels or renewable gases – biofuels and biogas – the most virtuous paths are only in their infancy”, adds Aurélien Bigo.
An alternative offer still too weak
Several other issues arise for tourist coach operators. “You have to be able to buy the equipment, maintain it, recharge it, and all that is not available on the market. It’s not necessarily the operators who don’t want it, but more the conditions for setting up implementation of these ambitions which are not yet present”, explains Eric Dresin, secretary general of Ectaa, the grouping of national unions of travel agencies and organizers in the European Union.
And not all operators are created equal. “It’s an additional burden. Generally for this type of question, the economic literature shows that innovation is an initial investment, but, in the medium and long term, companies will be able to adapt and take advantage of it. What worries me more are the VSEs and SMEs which have had an extremely fragile cash flow since 2020 and which will have more difficulty investing”, points out tourism specialist Sylvain Petit, lecturer in economics at the polytechnic university. Hauts de France.
One of the main black spots lies in the charging infrastructure for electric vehicles, which is currently insufficient in our territory. France has just passed the 100,000 terminal mark, a year and a half behind the date set by the government. Terminals which are also suitable for light vehicles only, and not for heavier ones, whose recharging time is much longer. “We have this contradiction between the stated objective and its realistic implementation”, regrets Eric Dresin, of Ectaa.
Will the State, on its side, do its share of the effort? “We will need economic support for our sector. We call on France to set up energy planning and support. We consider the current systems insufficient”, launches in any case the president of the FNTV, Jean-Sébastien Barrault. Unlike the mayor of Paris, the State has initiated a consultation on the ZFE, in which the federation of passenger transport participates. Moreover, the difficulty does not only arise for the tourism sector. Buses are also essential for school trips. “There will be a very legitimate need for schools. Today, we drop off groups of students in front of the Louvre or the Musée d’Orsay, we don’t take them on the metro. There is a practical and secure side “, emphasizes Jean-Sébastien Barrault.
Mass tourism clearly targeted
Behind this ban, the town hall of Paris is very clearly targeting mass tourism. “Tourists must adapt to new environmental standards, that is to say those of sustainable tourism. We can no longer have a person or a family spending a day in Berlin, then one in Paris, then a in Seville… The same goes for the length of stays: we are looking to work on longer formats”, explains the deputy mayor of Paris Frédéric Hocquard. “Like all businesses that are highly dependent on natural resources, tourism will have to reinvent a business model that does not go against nature. This involves a logic of self-limitation: each business should respect a budget consistent with the capacity to burden of the ecosystems in the territories which concern it”, abounds the economist Timothée Parrique.
Paris intends to capitalize on its network of infrastructures to allow tourists to travel as easily as possible on its soil, without going through coaches, at the risk of threatening the attractiveness of the most visited city in the world. “The vocation of the City of Paris is to have a more qualitative clientele, it will take a lot of time. We cannot, despite everything, deprive ourselves of American or Asian clientele. This contributes to the economy”, estimates the president. of the FNTV, Jean-Sebastien Barrault. For Julien Buot, director of the Agir association for responsible tourism, the solution must be sought on the side of the Seine: “This is a major underused axis. Why not put shuttles on the outskirts? should be able to circulate large groups of tourists. All environmental challenges are very good opportunities for professionals in the sector to demonstrate their know-how.”