The consultation launched by the Senate on Low Mobility Emission Zones met with great success among the French. Not surprisingly, the latter especially wanted to express their dissatisfaction.
The Senate is however in the habit of launching public consultations in order to ask the French for their feelings on such and such a subject, but never one of them had known such enthusiasm as the one opened on April 17 on the Zones low-emission mobility (ZFE-m). Philippe Tabarot, senator Les Républicains des Alpes-Maritimes, member of the regional planning and sustainable development commission, has today presented the results of the consultation on the EPZs for which he is the rapporteur. 51,346 people responded to the double questionnaire of 20 questions each, which is a real “success”, even if he made a point of specifying that this term was probably not necessarily appropriate. The last consultation to have caused so much reaction from the French was in connection with the question of 80 km/h… but it had had half as many answers. This means that French citizens feel concerned by this subject in particular. If they wanted to give their opinion, it was in particular to express their dissatisfaction…
86% of individuals against EPZs
First observation, individuals were a large majority to respond. They alone accounted for 93% of respondents. And among these some 47,000 French men and women, 86% of them indicated that they were against their deployment. Worse still, 69% are totally against it. Many professionals also take a dim view of ZFE-ms. 79% are unfavorable to their multiplication, and 60% of them are even very unfavorable to it.
If the questionnaire was composed of a majority of closed questions, the respondents were able to express themselves “This is a technocratic measure which, moreover, creates a real break in equal access to the city center depending on whether you be well off or not,” one replied. “There is blatant discrimination between different citizens; there are those who can afford to keep up with the required technology and there are others,” exclaimed another person. Another evokes a “feeling of injustice”. Some did not hesitate to speak of “anti-suburban measures” or “anti-provincials”. Strong terms.
And even among those – so few in number – who are nevertheless in favor of m-ZFEs, they note that their implementation poses problems. Among the difficulties encountered, the fact of not being able to afford a recent vehicle (Crit’Air 1) or an electric vehicle due to their high cost or the lack of public transport. Moreover, for Philippe Tabarot, the objective of the ZFE is not so much to ensure that the French get rid of their thermal model to move towards a zero emission car. If it is to end up with 40 million electric vehicles, it has no interest, he underlines. It would therefore be preferable for the “modal shift” to be made “towards public transport”.
Those who are for ZFE-m meet very specific criteria
The results of the consultation made it possible to highlight the fact that there is a cause and effect link between the fact that one accepts EPZs and that one lives in a metropolis: “8% of respondents residing in a rural municipality said they were in favor of the system, compared to 23% of those residing in the city center of the metropolis”, it is specified in the report.
Another element that makes us more in favor of EPZs, if we have “satisfactory alternative solutions to the use of the individual vehicle”. In other words, in territories where the public transport network is quite developed, respondents view EPZs favourably. In fact, only 16% of French people “believe that they have satisfactory alternative solutions”. Of these 16%, 67% say they are in favor of “the establishment of EPZs”.
Finally, the last element that seems to influence the position that we have vis-à-vis the EPZs, the socio-professional category. Managers and students are, of all the CSPs represented, those who are most in favor of this system with a proportion of people in favor which climbs to 25% and 28% respectively. On the contrary, only 4% of the workers are for the EPZs.
Respondents knowledgeable about EPZs-m
It should of course be noted that the respondents responded voluntarily to this consultation. This partly explains why 97% of them were familiar with the principle of EPZs. In the polls, we tend to notice that the French are rather a majority to ignore what it is. This is because polls operate on the principle of representativeness. Those who were aware of it took part in this consultation and this changes the situation somewhat, even if this does not detract from the fact that the figures are sufficiently telling for the resulting report, which Philippe Tabarot should submit around mid- June has a particular flavor and a deterrent effect on this increasingly contested system.
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