What Paris taught its former mayor Hidalgo about how cities should move

Few city leaders have attempted to change the way people move around their city as extensively as the former Mayor of Paris Anne Hidalgo. 

It is this relationship between mobility and the experience of a city that Hidalgo will bring to LIVEX in Abu Dhabi next week. 

During her 12 years as Mayor of Paris, streets were made more pedestrian-friendly, cycling infrastructure was expanded and cars were removed from areas where they had dominated traffic for decades. Perhaps the most visible change took place along the banks of the Seine. 

A road that once carried thousands of vehicles every hour is now used by people walking, cycling, exercising and spending time beside the river. The decision was fiercely contested at the time, but for Hidalgo it demonstrates something important about changing cities. 

“Mobility has a profound effect on everyday life,” she says. “It influences air quality, noise, how much time people spend travelling and how much public space is available for people to enjoy.” 

Changing the way that space was used became a defining feature of her administration. The aim, she says, was to make neighbourhoods healthier, safer and more pleasant places to live. 

It was not always popular. She acknowledges that changing established habits is difficult, particularly when residents immediately feel the effect on their journeys. Her experience in Paris convinced her that city leaders need to listen and explain what they are trying to achieve, while also taking a longer view of how their decisions will affect the city. 

The Seine became a test of that approach. Pedestrianising the riverbank faced considerable opposition, but Hidalgo argues that attitudes changed as people began to experience the space differently. 

The same thinking helped shape another idea closely associated with Paris during her mayoralty, the 15-minute city. 

The concept envisages neighbourhoods where people can reach many of the things they need in everyday life without having to make a long journey. Schools, shops, healthcare, parks and other services are considered alongside housing and transport, with greater attention paid to where they are located. 

For Hidalgo, the significance of the idea goes beyond the number 15. 

The wider question is how cities can give people better access to everyday services close to home while keeping neighbourhoods well connected to the rest of the city. 

That question takes on a different complexion in Abu Dhabi, which has a very different geography, climate and pattern of development from Paris, and Hidalgo is wary of assuming that ideas developed in one city can simply be transplanted into another. 

“Every city is different,” she says. Climate, geography, density and culture all influence the way people live and move. 

There may, however, be lessons from Paris that are particularly relevant to cities growing at speed. 

Much of Hidalgo's work involved adapting streets and neighbourhoods created generations earlier. Fast-growing cities have an opportunity to consider some of these questions while new communities and infrastructure are still being planned. 

Transport can be considered alongside where people will live, where they will work, how children will reach school and where public spaces and essential services will be located. Decisions made early can prevent problems that become considerably harder to solve once patterns of development and travel are established. 

The same principle applies to sustainability. 

Hidalgo rejects the assumption that making cities greener necessarily means making them less convenient. For people to change how they travel, she argues, they need realistic alternatives. Public transport needs to be reliable, walking needs to be safe and cycling needs suitable infrastructure. 

Reducing traffic can then have consequences beyond transport, from cleaner air and less noise to safer streets and more public space. 

At LIVEX in Abu Dhabi, the former Paris mayor will join international city leaders, policymakers, investors and experts to discuss the future of liveability at the inaugural event. 

For Hidalgo, mobility cannot be separated from the other issues on the agenda. 

Where housing is built affects travel patterns. Street design can influence health and physical activity. Transport determines access to employment, education and essential services. Decisions made in one area can have consequences across several others. 

The 15-minute city itself grew from this broader view of urban life. Its underlying argument was that housing, transport, education, healthcare, public space and other parts of everyday life work better when they are considered together. 

As cities look towards 2035, Hidalgo believes the starting point should remain the people who will use them. 

Transport networks will become more sophisticated and cities will continue to change, but the questions residents ask are likely to remain familiar. Can they get to work easily? Can their children travel safely? Are the things they need accessible? Do they have realistic choices about how they move? 

For a former mayor who spent more than a decade trying to answer those questions in one of the world's most densely populated capitals, the lesson from Paris is that decisions about mobility ultimately become decisions about how people live