Paris's famed Champs-Elysees avenue is destined for a green makeover as Mayor Anne Hidalgo pledged to transform the area into "extraordinary garden."

The major route was once dubbed the "the most beautiful avenue in the world" in France, but activists have complained in recent years that its allure has been damaged by noisy traffic and mass retail, making it an unattractive destination for Parisians. Hidalgo has now heeded their calls.

As part of plans to overhaul the city's polluting thoroughfares to make greener spaces for pedestrians and cyclists, the greening will start with the car-clogged Place de la Concorde square, which is expected to be completed before the Paris Olympic Games in 2024. Afterwards, the Socialist mayor's office plans to transform the whole avenue.

A Champs-Elysees lobby group said it was "delighted with this announcement and welcomes the decision by the mayor's office."

The plans will mean halving areas taken up by motor vehicles, pedestrianizing roads, and erecting avenues of trees to offset air pollution.

During her mayoral campaign last year, Hidalgo pledged to transform the French capital – already relatively dense, with more than 21,000 residents per square kilometer – into a '15-minute city': a collection of largely self-sufficient neighborhoods in which services, jobs, and amenities are within walking and cycling distance.

Aside from the reclamation of roads for pedestrians and cyclists, the mayor's campaign group Paris en Commun is pushing to break up the city's centralized system by encouraging more localized commercial and public hubs. 

Following her reelection in 2020, Hidalgo has doubled down on efforts to reduce traffic in the city, closing two main road arteries along the river Seine, while erecting new infrastructure for bikes and electric scooters.

"The deterioration since the 1970s in the avenue's conditions reflects the global destabilization of our ecosystems," PCA-Stream, the company behind the renovation, said in a statement.

"Our vision to replenish the avenue... calls for bringing together the research and resources of all public and private actors to make this area a laboratory of excellence for more sustainable, more desirable and more inclusive cities."

The Champs-Elysees was first laid out in 1670 but was renovated by Baron Haussmann, the architect behind the transformation of Paris under Napoleon III, in the mid-19th century.

Over the centuries, the avenue has been at the center of historical moments in French history: it was where Parisians celebrated the 1944 liberation from Nazi occupation. More recently, it was the scene of clashes between "yellow vest" anti-government demonstrators and police, as well as a rallying point for striking workers.

It is also used as the route for the Bastille Day military parade, which celebrates the French republic and its armed forces on July 14, as well as the finishing point for the annual Tour de France cycle race. 

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