Lyon is preparing to become the first French city to experiment with thermal carpooling radars from January 2024. These devices aim to strengthen respect for lanes reserved for carpooling and encourage more sustainable mobility. A great project… on paper.
In an effort to promote carpooling and reduce traffic jams, the city of Lyon announced the installation of thermal radars on urban boulevards M6-M7. These radars, a first in France, will be operational from the start of 2024 and aim to detect the number of users in vehicles using lanes dedicated to carpooling.
By monitoring compliance with carpool lanes, these devices could play a role in reducing traffic congestion and promoting more responsible mobility. However, their success will depend on the alternative infrastructures put in place and the acceptance of users to these new, ever more restrictive rules.
€135 fines for offenders
These thermal radars, installed upstream and downstream of the Fourvière tunnel, will make it possible to check the presence of at least two people in cars traveling on the reserved lane. These two radars will be installed on the old A6-A7 downgraded to the M6-M7 peri-urban boulevard. In the south direction upstream of the Fourvière tunnel on the M6, near the Pérollier interchange. In the direction of the North, it will be positioned around the tip of the Confluence a priori.
In the event of non-compliance, electronic fines of €135 will be sent to offenders. These radars will be managed by the Lyon municipal police, who will process the images captured and draw up reports. The whole problem was knowing who could take care of processing the photos, the Metropolis not having the police resources to do so, while it has had the legal possibility of recruiting agents since 2014. The city of Lyon, which clearly considers that its municipal police force is not busy enough, so it will dedicate half a day per week to one of its agents for this activity so that they can draw up the report and send it to ANTAI.
If this initiative follows a high fraud rate estimated at 50% in the absence of controls according to the municipality, the FO union is already pointing out a cruel understaffing of these agents for daily security missions.
Initiatives to develop carpooling
The experimentation of these radars is part of a broader approach aimed at optimizing the use of road infrastructure and combating single-person driving. By encouraging carpooling, the city of Lyon hopes to reduce road congestion and polluting emissions. This initiative could also serve as a model for other French cities.
Beyond Lyon, carpooling in France is trying to develop. Projects like Trapèze, launched by Vinci Autoroutes, aim to develop interconnected carpooling services, offering more diversified mobility alternatives. Likewise, the carpooling bonus, introduced in 2023, will undergo changes in 2024 to focus on short journeys and encourage more sustainable mobility.
But questions remain about their real effectiveness in promoting carpooling on a daily basis. Many applications exist such as BlaBlaCar or Covoit’ici, but the management of professional and personal travel, as well as the logistics of family activities, clearly constitute obstacles to the widespread adoption of carpooling for short journeys, and which do not seem to taken into account by communities who wish to punish rather than prevent.
Furthermore, even if it remains to be seen whether these initiatives will really encourage motorists to change their travel habits, when we look at the map of carpooling areas in large cities we remain a little doubtful: whether in the Paris region or in the Lyon metropolitan area, there is no area in the inner suburbs.
Finally, note that lanes reserved for carpooling are accessible when a vehicle carries at least two people, including a baby. These lanes are also open to emergency vehicles, public transport, taxis in service, as well as vehicles classified Crit’Air 0.
Source : Le Figaro
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