Voie Georges-Pompidou

France's then-prime minister, Georges Pompidou, opened the 13-kilometer^[2] expressway in 1967.

From 2002, part of the highway became a beach in summer, known as "Paris-Plages" and visited by 4 million people annually (as of 2007).^[3][4]

Cars were banned on the left bank of the Seine in 2013 and on the right bank in 2017, after several years of experiments.^[3] The removal of the car road happened under the mayors Bertrand Delanoë and Anne Hidalgo, the latter calling the process "a "reconquest" of the city for its residents.^[1] This development is seen as a key example of a trend in Europe^[1] and around the world^[5] of cities discouraging cars from their roads.

Before the road was closed to them, 43,000 cars used the road daily.^[6] While some protested against the removal of cars, the majority supported it.^[3]