France: Paris Mayor Elections - Anti-Motorcycle Candidate |
|
|
File under France Opinion
Author: Mike Werner
Location: Normandy, France
|
|
The elections for the Parisian mayor will be held next year and already the battles have started. The current mayor Bertrand Delanoe, a man who has done a lot of things AGAINST the motorcycle world, is stepping down. Several candidates have declared themselves, and funny enough they are all women.
 Anne Hidalgo |
The biggest contender is Anne Hidalgo, the current 1st deputy mayor, and the person behind all the current mayor's anti-motorcycle movements.
Already she has mentioned in her programs that she's planning even more drastic measures to curb motorcycles inside Paris (aside from the older motorcycles not allowed in the city, requiring mandatory annual technical inspection of motorcycles, no using of bus lanes - link  ). One of her pet peeves is the fact that motorcycles take up parking spaces in Paris. She wants to limit the number of parking spaces allocated to bikes in the country's capital. And that when there's already not enough spaces, and motorcycles are no longer allowed to park on sidewalks.
Needless to say, she's a treehugger, and wants people not to come into the city using polluting cars or motorcycles, instead they need to take a public transportation system that does not work, is on strike or is broken down. or use the bicycle or electric car sharing program.
It's obvious that this woman lives in a parallel universe where everyone lives close to where they work. But in the real world, people commute from the suburbs, since real estate prices in Paris are astronomical. So unless she, if ever she gets elected, invests a lot of money in a proper public transportation system, she'll have managed to close down many companies around Paris since their employees can not come to work (in fact the company I worked for in Paris closed down because of transportation problems and moved the Switzerland). Or maybe that is what she really wants....
 Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet |
Needless to say, the conservative party (UMP) candidate, Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet looks far more promising, although she hasn't mentioned much so far, she's more pragmatic. She has said however she's not someone who is going to undo things done in the past, but will look towards the future. I just hope that future involves motorcycles in a positive light.
Personally I'd much more prefer to have the current mayor of Nice, Christian Estrosi, running as mayor of Paris. Why? because he's a former MotoGP racer....(source )
|
|
|
Click here to Show/Hide 
