When Paris mayor Anne Hidalgo touted the idea of becoming a 15-minute city—a place where it’s easy to reach work, school, stores, and other destinations on a short walk or bike ride—it didn’t have as far to go as many other cities.
Hidalgo has pushed for multiple changes to help cut air pollution and improve quality of life, from making a highway car-free to adding so many bike lanes that the streets now look more like Copenhagen.
But Paris was already compact, densely populated, and relatively easy to walk around in.