This is a reversal that may leak a lot of ink. Judging "dated and outdated", Emmanuel Macron decided, Thursday, November 7, to bury EuropaCity, a megacomplex of shops and leisure that was to be established by 2027 in Val-d'Oise, north of Paris , and that bristling environmental advocates like small traders.
"The President of the Republic has decided not to pursue the EuropaCity project," the Elysee told AFP, confirming information first revealed by Le Monde, saying it "no longer meets the aspirations of our partners. fellow citizens".
The announcement comes at a time that is held Thursday afternoon a third Council of ecological defense. During the first council of this type in May, the executive announced the abandonment of the Montagne d'Or mining project in French Guiana.
"It is a great satisfaction," reacted to AFP Bernard Loup, president of the Collective for the Triangle of Gonesse (CPTG), historical opponent of the project. "Since the summer, we felt that this support has lukewarm as the debate on the artificialisation of land has mounted," worried his side end of October in Les Echos Vianney Mulliez, president of the real estate subsidiary from Auchan, Ceetrus, which shares EuropaCity equally with the Chinese group Wanda.
The fight pays off: the #EuropaCity mega shopping center project is definitely abandoned by President Macron! âś…
Congratulations to the collective @ nonaeuropacity1 💪🌱
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The megacomplex weighing 3.1 billion euros was to be based on what the CPTG described as "the most fertile land in ĂŽle-de-France", the Gonesse triangle, wedged between the Paris-Charles-de-France airports. -Gaulle and Bourget. Rarely did the agricultural unions also unanimously oppose the project.
Emmanuel Macron intends to bring out an "alternative project"
In a more global context of mobilization around environmental issues, the promoters had delivered their copy in early October, promising "zero carbon by 2027", 4,000 trees planted and 80 hectares of natural areas recreated in compensation. They also planned to reduce commercial space, while local traders worried about having to compete with hundreds of shops.
These changes will not have convinced. Emmanuel Macron wants to bring out an "alternative project" that could be implanted in a wider geographical area and that will have to be "more mixed, more modern, without creating an excessive pole of consumption, leisure and objects".
He entrusted "the mission to Francis Rol-Tanguy, former director of the Parisian Planning Workshop, to work with elected officials to develop a new project," says the Elysee.
Local elected officials were very much in favor of this "essential" project for the department, which "was always the poor relation" of the Île-de-France, they said at the beginning of October. "The government is sacrificing our territory in the name of a purely symbolic vision of ecology," thundered Thursday by communiqué the socialist mayor of Gonesse, Jean-Pierre Blazy.
Find my press release on the cancellation of # Europacity by the President of the Republic.
I am organizing a press conference tomorrow at 11 am, City Council room with the President of Val d'Oise and the President of Roissy Pays de Francehttps: //t.co/GyzbyBhSkM
"The disappointment is immense, one feels a disregard of the government compared to the suburbs", also reacted with the AFP Kamel Slimani, member of the "Collective of the real people", which ardently defended the project. "We have nothing, no transport, no metro, we are abandoned."
What future for the Greater Paris metro station ?
"In the face of the social consequences of the abandonment of this project", the president of the Île-de-France region, Valérie Pécresse, "solemnly appeals to the government to define, in partnership with the region and the department, a plan for urgency for the Val-d'Oise ", she reacted in a statement, claiming" the sanctuarization of line 17 of Greater Paris ".
Because the abandonment of EuropaCity raises the question of the future of the metro station of Grand Paris which was to serve the area "Triangle of Gonesse", and more broadly of this line 17 of the metro which must connect by 2027 Saint -Denis Pleyel at Roissy Charles-de-Gaulle airport. The National Federation of Transport User Associations (Fnaut) believes that it would lose interest without megacomplex.
"There is no change in transport projects," says the Elysee, including line 17.
I take note of the abandonment of # Europacity for environmental reasons, but I solemnly call on the government to define, with the region, an emergency plan for the Val d'Oise, which will bring jobs and jobs. hope for the inhabitants of its most popular territories
Valérie Pécresse (@vpecresse) November 7, 2019"We will continue to mobilize for the abandonment of the station and the idea of ​​urbanizing the Triangle of Gonesse," said his side Bernard Loup, the CPTG. The opponents of EuropaCity defend a project to make these lands the "food belt" that will irrigate the future Grand Paris in short circuits.
"We are talking about archipolluted land, between highways and airports," retorts Ali Soumaré, socialist regional councilor of Villiers-le-Bel, bitter against "a beautiful hypocrisy".
On the other hand, for Kamel Lakal, spokesperson of the collective Europasdutout, which represents 220 businesses and 70 members of the various city centers, the alternative project, "as long as it is not a commercial center, it will be very good", slides he to AFP.
With AFP