Cars have “gained” an average of 250 kilos in the last three decades. And they continue to grow length, height and width, at a rate of one centimeter every two years, according to a recent study by Transport & Environment (T&E).. SUVs, a motorized version of the American “Super Size Me”, have set out to conquer European cities precisely in the era of sustainable mobility.

Paris has rebelled against the trend and has decided to lead “the fight against self-obesity”, in the words of the environmental councilor Frédéric Badina-Serpette, who has criticized “the inexorable increase in the weight and size of the vehicles that circulate on the cities”.

Parisians have voted in favor of tripling the parking fees for these cars that weigh more than 2,500 kilos in their most cumbersome versions, which are considered the second cause of the increase in CO2 emissions in the last decade and which pose serious problems of occupation of public space and road safety.

The controversial measure was approved on February 4 in a referendum that had a low turnout (5%) and was very tight, with the support of 54.55% of the votes.. But the idea went ahead, promoted by the mayor of the capital Anne Hidalgo, as part of a series of initiatives to reduce traffic and make a city “more livable.”. Last year, after another popular consultation, electric scooters were eliminated in Paris.

18 euros per hour of parking

Starting in September, visitors entering the city with a car weighing more than 1.6 tons (two tons in the case of electric ones) will have to pay 18 euros per hour to park in Paris and 12 euros if they do so in Paris. the peripheral districts. According to the city council, this supplementary pricing will affect 10% of vehicles and will provide around 35 million euros of extra income for municipal coffers.

The Parisian example will be followed by the Lyon city council, led by Grégory Doucet, a prominent member of Europe Ecology. Starting in June, the third largest French city introduces new tariff sections (something like “parking by weight”) in order to “better share public space.”

The mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, in the midst of a crusade against pollution in the British capital, has warned that he will verify the “effectiveness” of the Paris measure and would be willing to copy it if it works. “SUVs take up a lot of space, they also generate road safety and emissions problems,” acknowledged Khan, who however lacks the powers to implement a similar measure throughout the city.

Khan has, however, referred to the steps in that direction that districts such as Westminster are taking, which have decided to review street parking rates based on vehicle emissions.. “SUVs should have no place in our cities and it is very sensible to take a toll for having these “monsters” stored on our streets,” declared Caroline Russell, representative of the Green Party in the London Assembly.

The situation in Spain

In Spain, sales of SUVs surpassed those of conventional cars for the first time in 2020 and today they occupy 60% of the market. Given the ubiquity in the cities of the heirs of all-terrain vehicles and 4x4s, in 2021 the General Directorate of Traffic sent the city councils an update on the width, height and length of the vehicles, so that they could establish rates. parking in restricted areas based on the space they occupy (and not just the label on the windshield).

No Spanish city has so far taken a step comparable to that of Paris. In some cities, such as Madrid, different rates are applied depending on the level of pollution, which can increase up to 100%, but the increase in rates does not take into account the size of the vehicles.

According to a recent study by the Walking Cities Network, 68% of public space on our streets is occupied by cars, compared to 32% for pedestrians.. “The trend is to recommend that the right to park in a public space be progressively avoided,” warns Ana Montalbán, technical secretary of the network that already brings together more than 80 cities.

From his point of view, “motorized mobility and sustainability run in opposite directions.. Cities have undertaken a detoxification process, and this trend collides with the development of increasingly voluminous cars due to market logic, of creating new needs based on a supposed version of comfort,” emphasizes Ana Montalbán.

“People are driving almost “armored” in these vehicles designed more for work in the countryside or risky sports than for urban mobility,” says the architect and urban planner.. “Their vision creates an impression of power and feelings of threat to people walking or cycling.”

The NGO WWF considers that SUVs are “an aberration” for global warming, as they are heavier and more voluminous than a normal car.. Greenpeace warns that the SUV boom is serving to neutralize all the progress on climate change by car manufacturers that had opted for electrification.

“The shift towards heavier and less efficient vehicles is behind the increase in oil consumption and emissions,” warned the International Energy Agency in a devastating report in 2023. If the more than 330 million SUVs in circulation were a country, they would rank sixth in the world for emissions close to 1,000 million tons of CO2 in a year.

The latest wave of climate activism is precisely the group Tire Extinguishers, spread across a dozen European countries and Canada. The “Tire Extinguishers” have already acted in some Spanish cities, with radical actions to “deflate” SUVs, in protest of their environmental impact and the space they occupy on the streets.