Summer of sport: disruption for drivers in Paris

The iconic skyline of Paris has been the backdrop for 19 days of world sport, as the French capital welcomed more than 10,000 athletes to compete in 329 events across 32 sports for the Paris 2024 Olympics.

Over the course of the Summer Games, more than 11.5 million visitors were expected in Paris  – and authorities implemented a series of road closures to deal with the traffic around key Olympic venues.

The largest shutdown covered the roads from the Eiffel Tower to the Louvre. Between the Champ-de-Mars to Trocadéro and Tuileries, traffic was completely banned, even for local residents.

 

Throughout Paris 2024, HERE has been tracking real-time traffic disruption around each of the Olympics’ sites. Its congestion score – also called jam factor – ranks traffic disruption on a score from 0-10.

Zero to <4 represents free-flowing traffic, while 4 to <6.3 shows minor congestion through to heavier traffic, but is not yet considered slow. Heavy and slow traffic is represented by a score of 6.3 to <8, while 8 to <9 shows heavy and queuing traffic.

Stationary traffic is anything between 9 to <10, while 10 represents a blocked highway – such as a road closure. As HERE tracks traffic within a 1km radius of the venue, it shows how road closures have a knock-on effect on the roads nearby.

Let’s take a look at how key Olympic events and venues were affected by traffic congestion.

Staying Seine

For the first time in Olympics history, the event’s opening ceremony took place outside a stadium, with athletes traveling 6km down the Seine by boat before the parade finale at the Trocadéro, right in the heart of the city.

A traffic ban was put in place at the Trocadéro spanning the entire event. Unsurprisingly, as the epicenter for the ceremony, the roads around the area were particularly congested between July 18^th and 27^th, with a congestion score above nine.

Making miles

From July 27^th onward, congestion on the roads around the Trocadéro halved before climbing again on August 10^th and 11^th for the men and women’s marathons respectively, when large swathes of Parisian streets were closed to traffic.

Other areas heavily impacted by the marathons were the Pont Alexandre III, Place de la Concorde, Les Invalides and the Eiffel Tower, where congestion scores were above nine on both days.

Keeping it 100

The men’s 100m final is always a big crowd puller at the Games, and at the Stade de France on the 4^th of August, thousands of fans were there to watch the USA’s Noah Lyles achieve a personal best of 9.79 seconds. Traffic around the stadium was busy all day, building to a peak of 6.14 on the congestion tracker at 5pm.

Traffic was also busy the previous day on the roads around the Stade de France, when it played host to the women’s 100m final, peaking at 5.97 at 6:30pm. Saint Lucian runner Julien Alfred set a new national record when she posted a time of 10.72 seconds – probably moving faster than the surrounding traffic.

 

Setting sail

Not all the Olympics action took place in Paris. Marseille, on the south coast of France, played host to sailing at the city’s Roucas-Blanc Olympic Arena, where traffic fluctuated over the course of two weeks to a high of 6.96 during the women’s kite race.

Breaking free

The 2024 Paris Olympic Games welcomed breaking (aka breakdancing) as a new sport, with the women’s competition taking place on August 9^th at the Place de la Concorde public square. Despite road closures around the venue, traffic was particularly heavy on surrounding roads, peaking at 7.76.

Aiming for gold

Les Invalides, home to the tomb of Napoleon Bonaparte, drew large crowds for the men’s archery on August 4^th. Traffic congestion on the roads around the area was mostly at a standstill with a congestion score that peaked at 8.11.

Hitting par

The Albatros course at Le Golf National, an 18-hole venue on the outskirts of Paris, welcomed some of the sport’s biggest names on August 4^th. Traffic rose sharply throughout the day, peaking at 9.68 at 6pm as people made their way home from the event.

Riding high

Elancourt Hill, the highest point in Paris, offers breathtaking views of the Eiffel Tower and the city. Situated 41km outside Paris, it hosted the mountain biking events, but perhaps because of its distance from the city, and because most of the action takes place on trails away from the roads, traffic remained very light throughout the Olympics, peaking at 2.20 for the women’s event on July 28^th, and 2.83 for the men’s on the 29^th.

Cruising to LA

The finale of the 2024 Paris Olympics saw the event close in spectacular fashion at the Stade de France, the national stadium of France. Despite a ceremony that saw Hollywood actor Tom Cruise hand over the Olympic flag to Los Angeles, which plays host in 2028, the roads around the stadium remained congested but not at a standstill, with a peak congestion score of 6.57 at 9pm on August 11^th.

Areas worse affected during the closing ceremony were central locations such as Place de la Concorde (with a peak congestion score of 9.43 at 11:45pm), Pont Alexandre III (with a congestion score of 9.50), and Les Invalides (with a congestion score of 9.67), indicating standstill traffic on the roads.

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass has announced ambitious plans to make the 2028 Summer Olympics car-free, aiming to borrow 3,000 buses to support the effort. This initiative is sure to transform visitor experiences, enhance delivery services and improve emergency vehicle accessibility, while also offering valuable guidance and insights for future host cities. 

It will also be intriguing to see how successful bids for the Games - such as Brisbane in 2032 - tackle traffic management in the future.