“The tram to the Catalans? Dumbest thing I've heard"

• Marseille has been ruled by the left for two years.

  Benoît Payan affirms in an interview with "20 Minutes Marseille" that he wants to extend the pedestrianization of part of the city by the end of the mandate.

• The mayor also says he is ready to use his police powers if the metropolis begins work for the Catalans tramway before those for the opening up of the northern districts, as part of the “Marseille en grand” plan.

Pedestrianization, housing, transport… While the city of Marseille has been tilting to the left for two years now, i.e. a third of its mandate, the mayor of the city Benoît Payan gave a long interview to

, and swept the construction sites that offer themselves to him.

This Friday marks the return of the pedestrianization of the Old Port for the summer.

Are you going to make it permanent?

On 1,200 km² of roads, we must have perhaps 900 meters pedestrianized.

If you do the ratio, you realize that we are the dunce's cap of the big cities of Europe.

I was born here, and had never been able to walk on the Old Port as I had for two years.

Never.

I'm not the only one.

There was a lot of reluctance at first.

Residents and traders wondered how they were going to do it.

Obviously, there are still some and we will always find some, but less and less.

I have restaurants in the Old Port who said to me: “It's not good.

This year, they came to see me to say: “I hope you are going to pedestrianize it.

That's the meaning of the story.

And so, gradually, what is ephemeral, temporary, will become permanent.

It will take time, but I hope that by the end of the mandate, we will have greatly increased permanent pedestrianization in certain places in the city.

Is it such and such a street, such and such a square?

We'll see, but it won't stop.

Because it is so.

We are already in a revolution.

We were in a city that was all car, all motorcycle, big nonsense.

It is little by little that we make conquests.

I am not for making things violent.

Things must gradually become acceptable and be shared.

It is a conquest over the time that has passed.

How at your level can you get Marseille out of the car altogether?

There are not good guys on one side and bad guys on the other.

On the other hand, I asked the President of the metropolis and the President of the Republic to consider that Marseille is a large French city which can no longer be satisfied with having two metro lines inaugurated in 1978. Based on this observation, I went to meet the President.

I said to him: “What are we doing?

“We made a plan for the schools.

And he decided to put on the table a billion euros with one condition: the opening up of the northern districts.

There will be no state aid if the president of the department does not understand this obvious thing, said in all tones by the head of state and by myself: the northern districts must be opened up.

You have to take a tram that goes to the northern districts.

It is the priority of priorities.

This rather than burning millions of euros, money that belongs neither to the president nor to me, but to the Marseillaises and the Marseillais, in a tram that no one wants to hear about...

That of the Catalans?

(He continues) Neither the mayor of 1-7, nor the mayor of 6-8, nor the mayor of 2-3, nor myself, nor the inhabitants, nor the merchants, nor the CIQs [interest committees of quartier], who are not proactive militants of the Printemps Marseillais.

Nobody wants that.

It makes no sense to go and dig a trench, open up, massacre the city.

She will have to cut down all the trees in Cours Pierre-Puget.

We're going to have to smash the avenue de la Corse.

It's no use.

The works will be started during the works of the Olympic Marina, during those of the Corniche, during the Olympic Games.

It's the dumbest, most absurd thing I've heard.

The President doesn't want to give the money for that.

That does not make any sense.

We have a metropolis that remains stuck in a project by Jean-Claude Gaudin in 2001. So what should be done?

The state will have to assume its responsibilities.

If Martine Vassal decides not to make a tramway to the north, it will have to be done in her place.

The state will have to take its share of the responsibility.

We will have to prevent the metropolis if it decides to force through.

I would prevent it.

I would use all my police powers.

There will be no tramway to the Catalans until the tramway to the north is launched.

This is a point from which I will not deviate.

Speaking of the state, we are now in a period of parliamentary instability, with a new government.

There is therefore a new political deal.

What are your expectations in this context regarding the “Marseille en grande” plan?

I expect the government to keep its word.

The continuity of the state is something I particularly care about.

The President of the Republic is committed.

The previous parliament got involved.

The appropriations have been voted, and are included in the finance bill.

Madame Borne, I don't know her.

I don't know the sound of his voice except through the TV or my cell phone.

We never met.

Well… We'll see what happens.

I wish that we can have working relations and cordial relations.

For the moment, I find it focused on a new difficulty when one does politics: that of having a strong parliament.

Personally, I am pleased that parliament is a parliament where the deputies serve a purpose and give meaning to what they do.

It will be up to her to think, negotiate and move things forward.

Obviously, if she were to weaken "Marseille en grand", she would find me in the middle of her road, facing her.

Accommodation in Marseille has become very expensive in recent years.

However, housing had been decreed a great municipal cause by the Printemps Marseille.

How to stop the machine?

The land pressure is terrible, and I don't want this city to become impossible for the little Marseillaises and the little Marseillais who are twenty years old, sometimes older, and who want to settle down, buy or rent.

And I don't want people who come to settle in Marseille to think that it's more expensive than elsewhere and that it's too complicated for them.

It's a city that has been attractive because it has remained particularly interesting, popular, united.

In reality, it was obvious that such a beautiful city, on the shores of the Mediterranean, was not going to stay off the radar for long.

That's why there are five million tourists every year.

And that's why the land pressure continues.

What to do against it?

I want to avoid speculation as much as possible.

I made the choice to put a helm on the multi-owners who make Airbnb.

I have whole streets in Le Panier where property dealers have come to buy buildings in which there are no longer any inhabitants, no longer any neighborhood life.

Prices are exploding.

So I hit hard, and I will continue, on those who make Airbnb.

I have resources.

For example, I am in favor of requisitioning the assets of tax evaders.

People who pretend they are renting apartments to students when they are doing Airbnb, who do not pay taxes or taxes, and who deprive people who need it of housing, I am for requisitioning their belongings.

Then, you have to do land conquest.

And it is very difficult.

We signed the biggest urban renewal plan in history.

Never, the ANRU had put nearly a billion euros on the table.

It's a huge change that in four years will be seen.

In your program, you promised the construction of 30,000 housing units…

We will probably renovate it.

We hit a terrible wall.

I have a PLUi [local intermunicipal urban planning plan] which allows me to build 3,000 homes a year.

Beyond that, it is prohibited.

I asked to change.

I was told no.

From there, what do you want me to do?

You now understand why I wanted to make “Marseilles big” and change the governance of the metropolis.

You're about a third into your term, and things...

(He cuts) It's never fast enough.

But will it ultimately take an additional term to keep your election promises?

I take care of the existing mandate.

My job is to get things done.

It's not to say to myself: “Am I going to do a second, a third, a fourth term?

What will happen electorally in 2026 or 2027?

I do not care.

You have to work, in life.

And then, if the Marseillais think it was good, well, we continue.

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