Ln September 7, 2023, Paris City Hall announced the closure of the Bercy-Seine bus station to long-distance coaches (SLO, freely organized services, known as “Macron coaches”), even though this bus station is the busiest in the country: between 3.7 and 4.55 million travelers in 2022. This announcement, considering mobility needs, could have very negative consequences: shift towards more expensive and more polluting modes of transport; waiver of travel; less accessibility of the capital for tourists, etc.
This situation is the symptom of an original forgetting: in 2015, the law liberalized regular passenger transport by coach but did not provide for the creation of a national network of bus stations. Therefore, even if the coach is now popular with millions of French people, the lack of infrastructure prevents the development of this shared mobility solution.
However, even if it is sometimes the subject of unfounded criticism and preconceived ideas, the coach is a mode of collective transport bringing many benefits, as pointed out the Transport Regulatory Authority. It allows users to travel anywhere in France at low cost, generating profits.
The sustainability of the coach mobility offer
It would therefore be a mistake to deprive millions of French people, particularly the poorest, of a means of transport which relies on the efficiency of the French road network, one of the largest in Europe, and which can easily adapt to changes in travel habits.
Therefore, to guarantee the sustainability of the coach mobility offer, an ambitious national plan in favor of bus stations is necessary. This plan that we are calling for is based on three simple pillars:
First, the creation of a “standard” based in particular on the work of the Cerema to guarantee the homogeneity of the future network of bus stations: location in the city center (or immediate outskirts); multimodality with the rail offer and public transport; high level of safety, hygiene and services (ticketing; shops; catering; refueling), 24-hour accessibility (particularly for people with reduced mobility) to guarantee the availability of night coaches. This standard will make it possible to catch up with France and provide the country with infrastructure similar to what users can find in other European cities (London, Milan, Amsterdam, Madrid).
You have 70% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.