After the Paris 2024 Olympics – what does Paris have now?

After the Paris 2024 Olympics – what does Paris have now?

Paris was a party. Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo, expressing gratitude to the people of Paris, said, “Thanks to the Games, we have found the joy in being together.” After the social distancing of the pandemic from 2020-2022, it was surely time to party hard in the streets, to embrace each other again, neighbour and stranger, local and international, all people everywhere. 

The Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games are gone but not forgotten. The feeling of togetherness will linger awhile, but its legacies are physical, visible, and tangible all over the 20 arrondissements (districts) of Paris and beyond. The mayor’s office released a 52-page publication outlining the changes in Paris due to the Paris 2024 Games.

Sport for Everyone

By the end of 2024, there will be 3,000 new inclusive clubs with better access to sports activities for people with disabilities. Forty member associations of the network of paraccueillant clubs (RCP) will promote para-sport in Paris – with adapted cycling, para-swimming, para-archery, and para-athletics. The French government has also declared the promotion of physical and sporting activity a national cause with the introduction of 30 minutes of daily physical activity for 4.5 million primary school children.

Free supervised Sports Sundays – Paris Sport Dimanches – were introduced in sporting venues, parks, and squares for the public to use equipment, such as fit boxing, cardio training, and  table tennis, every Sunday morning. To date, 6,000 Parisians at nearly 20 sites have benefitted from these outdoor sessions.

The Paris Sport Seniors program was also recently introduced for people over the age of 55 where more than 200 people (72.5% of them women) have already benefitted from more than 230 organized sessions. More than 50% of participants attended more than 15 sessions each. 

Paris Sportives, co-financed by the Paris 2024 Endowment Fund, is supporting outdoor sportto promote diversity and encourage women and teenage girls to exercise in public spaces. Every week, 32 clubs and associations offer free activities to 2,588 women in more than 50 fields, squares, and gardens.

A new venue – the Adidas Arena – was built for the Paris 2024 Games in the north of Paris in the 18th arrondissement to accommodate 8,000 spectators – which is now the home of the district Paris basketball club and two gymnasiums for residents. Five sporting facilities benefitted from energy-efficient building renovations around Paris – the Pierre-de-Coubertin stadium in the 16th arrondissement, the boxing hall at the Max-Rousié center in the 17tharrondissement, the Bertrand-Dauvin center and the Poissonniers center in the 18th and the Georges-Vallerey swimming pool in the 20th. 

Additionally, 34 basketball courts, 5 handball courts, 3 urban tennis courts, and 2 football fields were renovated for the Paris 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games.

Water

There was much controversy over the water quality of the river Seine and its capacity to hold Olympic and Paralympic events. Despite postponements to the triathlons (swim, cycle, and run) due to the daily water quality test being below target on scheduled days, the events were re-scheduled. With ongoing emphasis on water quality, the public are expected to be able to swim in the river from the summer of 2025. Every summer in the future, the public will be able to enjoy three safe supervised swimming spots in the river, delineated by buoys and a pontoon with spaces for changing, showering, and storing belongings on the quays: at the Marie arm, the Grenelle arm, and at Bercy.

To achieve this, Paris established 2 water treatment plants with systems to decontaminate water discharged into the natural environment; connected 3,000 homes to the sewerage network from 2016-2024 that previously had caused untreated water to be discharged directly into the Seine; provided funds to 159 barges moored in the river as homes and public restaurants to

facilitate their adaptation to connect to the sewerage system; and increased the riverside vegetation so that rainwater flows into the ground in the natural environment.

Improved water quality means restored biodiversity. In the 1970s, there were only two identified species of fish in the river that runs through Paris. Now there are 34 different recorded species of fish in the Seine – trout, eels, lampreys, and shad.

The Austerlitz basin in the 13th arrondissement, after 3.5 years of construction, opened in May 2024 to store wastewater and rainwater to prevent them from being discharged into the Seine. The basin is 50 metres in diameter and 34 metres deep, storing the equivalent of 20 Olympic swimming pools of water.

About 500,000 plastic bottles were not used during the Paris 2024 Games thanks to the “Here, I choose Paris water” campaign. Nearly 1,100 Parisian merchants were ready to fill people’s water bottles for free. Drinking water during the heat wave of the summer Olympics was more accessible to more people. Paris installed 1,200 drinking water points in parks, gardens, cemeteries, and public streets; 123 new two-in-one fountains (drinking and misting); and 50 iconic green Wallace drinking fountains.  

The Paris 2024 Games also marked the end of single-use plastic for approximately 50 road races held each year in Paris  (in which more than a million bottles of water are consumed per year during the races). From 1 September 2024, event suppliers will be provided exclusively with reusable cups or reusable water bottles.

Public Spaces

More cycle paths, pedestrian promenades, and greenery are in place due to the Paris 2024 Games. A total of 60 kilometres of cycle paths were created with 10,000 temporary bicycle racks installed near the Olympic sites. These bike racks have been redistributed to sport centres, schools, and municipal facilities. A total of 1,750 bus stops were established, making 59 bus lines accessible for people with reduced mobility as well as the elderly or people with baby strollers. Achieving in three years what would have normally taken 20 years, the accessibility of bus lines has been greatly accelerated. In July 2024, Paris inaugurated 17 hyper-accessible neighborhoods for all. These are “exemplary zones” enabling any individual to move around Paris easily and have access to all municipal services (accommodation, sports, health, shops, schools, and culture).

In 2025, the Place de la Concorde in the 8th arrondissement, the Olympic site for urban sports, will change its appearance. The project aims to re-establish the link between the Avenue des Champs-Élysées and the Tuileries Gardens by reducing motorized traffic and increasing spaces for pedestrians, with 30-40% more vegetation. The greening of the Avenue des Champs-Élysées has already begun. A green promenade will extend from the Louvre to the Chaillot hill with trees, lawns, and flowerbeds.

The Olympic and Paralympic village is preparing to become an environmental area of the city for residents of Seine-Saint-Denis from 2025, with schools and colleges, shops, offices, parks, and gardens. About 2,800 new homes will become available with 94% generated by deconstruction recycled and recovered materials. Almost 40% of the new homes will be dedicated to social housing. In addition, 8,000 trees have already been planted.

Paris reduced the maximum speed of vehicles on all roads on and around the Ring Road (the periphery) to 50 km/h to reduce air and noise pollution for the 500,000 residents along these routes. 

Arts and Culture

Gold medalists rang the Olympic bell, engraved with the Paris 2024 emblem, in the France Stadium. This Olympic bell will be installed in one of the renovated towers of the Notre-Dame Cathedral.

Twenty-four artworks (murals, sculptures, canvases, textiles, frescoes, etc.), created by artists and students in Paris’s applied arts schools as part of the Ex-Aequo project for the Games, will be exhibited in 24 sporting facilities in the capital. Honoured during the opening ceremony of the Paris 2024 Games, the statues of the ten golden women will take their permanent place in the north of the capital.

The Charles-Aznavour garden in the 8th arrondissement will be home to an Olympic sculpture by American artist Alison Saar. A monumental fresco at the Porte de Clignancourt at the Place des Tirailleurs-Sénégalais in the 18th arrondissement, with its bright colours and animated objects, will remain until 2028, along with another three frescoes. Two artists, American Katbing and French Kekli, created the Clignancourt artwork, embodying para-sport with an  image of a wheelchair athlete, American sport through the image of a baseball, and urban sport via a skateboard. All four frescoes symbolize the cooperation between Paris and Los Angeles for the Olympic and Paralympic Games. 

And the Olympic dream continues: the iconic Olympic rings will remain on the Eiffel Tower until the opening of the Los Angeles 2028 Olympic Games.

The Olympic party in Paris is over, but the legacy of the Paris 2024 Games continues …

NEW PARIS BOOK IN PROGRESS IN 2024: GLAD, MAD AND SAD – Blog # 27        

NEW PARIS BOOK IN PROGRESS IN 2024: GLAD, MAD AND SAD – Blog # 27.

Glad, mad and sad – emotions, emotions, emotions! In every novel, there are characters full of emotions. How are characters’ emotions written on the page? What emotions does an author want readers to feel – blissfully happy and excited for a character, or seething and reeling that a character is not doing what is expected, or tearful in solidarity at a character’s demise? 

Should a character’s emotions be in order, progressive, climactic? In my upcoming Paris book, will my main character be glad then mad then sad; or mad then sad then glad? Or maybe sad then mad then glad? Does mad mean angry, enraged, irate or does it mean depressed, crazy, off-the-wall? 

Continue reading “NEW PARIS BOOK IN PROGRESS IN 2024: GLAD, MAD AND SAD – Blog # 27        “

Paris periphery

Paris periphery.

An electric tramway operates around the perimeter of Paris – le périphérique – the periphery, locally known as the “periph.” Alongside the tramway rail circuit are pathways and streets that, more or less, follow the rail circuit. It’s a good circuit for running, walking, cycling, or taking the dog for a stroll.

When feeling depressed, visit the Paris Opera

When feeling depressed, visit the Paris Opera.

Irish author James Joyce had a routine throughout most of his twenty years living in Paris: ‘He gets up around nine, writes a little, but spends most of the morning on the phone, and chins with his friends by the hour. Before lunch he plays and sings, and afterwards works until five o’clock … After five he walks, alone … He likes the opera, the theatre (never misses a Thursday matinee), song recitals, and even movies,’ wrote biographer Gordon Bowker. 

When James Joyce was depressed, it was his passion for opera that ‘saved’ him. Gordon Bowker wrote that when Joyce grew depressed, he had little or nothing to say to Nora, his wife, and only livened up when one of Maria Jolas’s Parisian friends talked with him about opera.

Joyce’s American avant-garde friend, composer George Antheil (1900-1959), suggested to Joyce that he write an opera based upon the Cyclops episode in his 1922 book Ulysses. Conor Fennell wrote about it in his autobiography, saying that Antheil suggested: 

‘Instrumentally, there would be thirteen electic pianos. There would be drums, steel xylophones and various other loud instruments. The score would be played at great speed with crescendos and diminuendos achieved by switching pianos on and off. The singers would be out of sight, singing into microphones attached to loudspeakers on the stage, and a corps de ballet would mime the action. 

As with other planned collaborations between Antheil and Joyce, it came to nothing.’

An Irish friend of James Joyce, poet Padraic Colum (1881-1972), had a ‘poor ear for music’ and ‘lacked Joyce’s unbridled enthusiasm’ for opera. When Joyce and Colum went to the Paris Opera, ‘Colum seems to have been more impressed by the Opera House than by the opera, savouring the presence of smartly dressed dignitaries with chains and women bedecked with wraps and jewels,’ wrote Conor Fennell.

Most of Joyce’s residences were on the Left Bank, far from the National Opera of Paris wich was located on the Right Bank in the 9th arrondissement of Paris. But not too far that prevented him from strolling to the opulent building. 

With Australian friends in Paris, that’s where we headed on a grey November day – not to see an opera but to see the building of The Palais Garnier known as the Garnier Palace, the L’Opéra Garnier, Paris Garnier, or the Opera House. 

Charles Garnier (1825-1898) was the architect commissioned by Emperor Napoleon III to oversee the construction of the building from 1861-1875 which became known as the new Paris Opera that hosted both opera and ballet productions. The construction of the Bastille Opera House in the 12th arrondissement in 1984-1990 relegated The Palais Garnier to secondary status for hosting operas and is now primarily used for ballet productions by the Paris Opera Ballet. 

The buiding of The Palais Garnier is 56 metres tall (184 feet) and 155 metres (508 feet) long, with a façade of 32 metres (105 feet). It is famous mainly for five aspects: 1) the main façade, 2) the auditorium (the stage), 3) the grand staircase, 4) the chandeliers, and 5) the mosaic tiles. 

On the day of our visit, yesterday, the main façade was under renovation and covered with a massive advertisement for Ralph Lauren, and the auditorium was closed for public viewing due to rehearsals. Nevertheless, there was much to see – for a small fee. 

NEW PARIS BOOK IN PROGRESS IN 2024: THE LOVER OR THE CLICHÉ – Blog # 26        

NEW PARIS BOOK IN PROGRESS IN 2024: THE LOVER OR THE CLICHÉ – Blog # 26.

This is Paris. There must be a lover in my new Paris book. Why? Because this is Paris. Oh, the cliché! Oh, the dilemma! 

‘Cliché’ means that a phrase or idea or opinion – or even a character – is  over-used. We’ve heard it all before, Martina. It lacks original thought. But, what would a Paris book be if it doesn’t have a lover? Boring? 

Cliché! Isn’t that a French word? A dated French word – as opposed to a dating French word. It was originally the sound of a printing press that duplicated the same page over and over and over. Some clichés live on and on and on – changing with the times and the modern copy machines, I guess. 

Continue reading “NEW PARIS BOOK IN PROGRESS IN 2024: THE LOVER OR THE CLICHÉ – Blog # 26        “

The Birth of Department Stores exhibition, Paris

The Birth of Department Stores exhibition, Paris.

The exhibition “The Birth of Department Stores” – “La naissance des Grands Magasins” – at the Museum of Decorative Arts – Musée des Arts décoratifs (MAD) – in Paris from 10 April to 13 October 2024 explores the evolution of Parisian department stores from 1852 to 1925. It focuses on fashion, design, furniture, toys, posters, and advertising. 

The period is from the Second Empire to the International Exhibition of Decorative and Industrial Arts in 1925. It was the golden age of Parisian department stores such as:

Les Magasins du Louvre.

Le Bon Marché, 

La Samaritaine, 

Le Printemps,

Les Galeries Lafayette, and 

These department stores revolutionized retail and played a significant role in the evolution of consumer society, fashion, sales, and the emergence of children as a new target market. The rise of mail-order sales is also shown. 

This is the first part of a 2-part series of the history of department stores from the mid-19thcentury to the present day. The second part from 16 October 2024 to 16 March 2025 dives further into the history from mid-19th century to the contemporary era – and to iconic commercial architecture. 

Amélie Gastaut, chief curator of advertising and graphic design collections, is the exhibition curator.

We did it, We did it! J’ai fait les Jeux! (I was in the Games!)

We did it, We did it! J’ai fait les Jeux! (I was in the Games!).

I’ve received my official Badge for volunteering at the Paris 2024 Olympics and Paralympics. ‘Paris2024’ and its Official Partners have awarded the volunteers of the Olympics and Paralympics with a J’ai fait les Jeux (I was in the Games) Open Badge in recognition of their personal contribution to the success of the Games.

The email states that the Badge validates that we ‘used and developed organizational, interpersonal, and communication skills’ and that it vouches for the volunteers’ behaviour and attitude.

The French Government has a service that enables the Open Badge to be used to map personal skills to generate a curriculum vitae – the equivalent of a ‘Skills Passport.’ It is a digital file in which skills and achievements developed informally are recorded, which may assist volunteers who are seeking employment (in France and beyond) to have their skills recognized.

The Open Badge is an international program recognized by the French Ministry of Labour, Health and Solidarity, the Ministry of Sports, the Olympic and Paralympic Games, the Public Employment Services, and all of the organizations that sponsored the Games.

I’m channeling Dora the Explorer, the seven-year-old girl, who embarks on adventures with her friend Boots the monkey. It’s an American children’s animation program that aired from 2000 to 2019. In every episode, Dora and Boots always succeed. So, just as Dora sings when she ends her adventure, I’m singing “We did it! We did it! We did it! Yeah! Hooray! Woo! We did it!” Yes, these are the exact lyrics of Dora’s song. We did it!

NEW PARIS BOOK IN PROGRESS IN 2024: STORY SCENE AND SEEN – Blog # 25        

NEW PARIS BOOK IN PROGRESS IN 2024: STORY SCENE AND SEEN – Blog # 25.

Can you visualize a scene in your book – is the story scene seen? Are the words forming a scene in your mind – can you see it in your mind? Or do you need to see the scene before you write it? 

After my long break from writing my book, due to volunteering at the Paris 2024 Olympics and Paralympics, I’m ready to get back into the scene. I need to reflect on the concept and writing to date, scene by scene. This is how I’m going to attempt it. 

Continue reading “NEW PARIS BOOK IN PROGRESS IN 2024: STORY SCENE AND SEEN – Blog # 25        “