Observing the unfolding chaos around the Rue Van Gogh leading to Gare de Lyon, it seemed on Thursday night that Paris had reached some kind of unsteady accommodation with the Olympics.
The hubris and practicality of hosting the Olympic Games was taking a toll. The Olympics have come at a price to the city, especially for this week leading to Friday night’s Opening Ceremony.
Below the clogged avenue at the Pont Charles de Gaulle, pods of police stood and patrolled around the caged river Seine with traffic diverted away from the 6km stretch up as far as the Eiffel Tower at Trocadero, where the ceremony will climax.
It will wind its way from the Austerlitz bridge beside the Jardin des Plantes, make its way around the two islands at the centre of the city (the Île Saint Louis and the Île de la Cité) and finally at the Léna bridge the flotilla will come to a stop. The numbers are impressive.
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Up to 300,000 ticketed spectators are set to watch from stands and on the riverbanks and another 200,000 expected to witness the spectacle from the overlooking apartments as up to 6,000 athletes float by on 85 barges and boats.
And so, the locals honked and screeched, bikers slammed their hands on roofs, mounted pavements and ignored the colour of traffic lights as vehicles ground to an almighty halt or lurched inch by inch forward in warm evening heat.
But it hasn’t just been the traffic spluttering away from the sealed river. As ESPN reported last month, even the booksellers along the banks of the Seine were asked to pack their belongings and leave to provide space for the spectators.
The old green boxes that decorate the banks right through the city, selling second hand books, old prints and comics have been there for several hundred years and numerous conflicts including two world wars. The demand that they leave seemed unkind.
Then, in true French fashion, they rebelled and following the intervention of president Emmanuel Macron the traders were allowed to stay. French culture won out and the spectator capacity was reduced.
There are 45,000 members of the French security forces available when the Games begin because France, as the organisers like to say, has brought the games to the people and the city. Like London in 2012, events are being staged at the most iconic monuments.
In 2012 London ran the Triathlon around Hyde Park, swimming in the famous Serpentine and cycling around Buckingham Palace. There is a picture somewhere in the archives of this Irish team’s Chef de Mission, Gavin Noble, skating past the King’s famous pile as a triathlete.
So, in Paris over the coming weeks, beach volleyball is at the Eiffel Tower, archery at the Invalides and skateboarding at the Place de la Concorde.
A consequence of inviting the sports on to the streets is that security is an issue. Waiting for the RER in the Chatelet des Halles station to go to Stade de France for the Rugby Sevens, one of the few events to begin before the Opening Ceremony, a flashing warning appeared on the electronic display.
“Traffic is disrupted throughout the line due to the intervention of law enforcement at La Courneuve-Aubervilliers station due to a forgotten bag.”
Ho hum. Earlier in the week top organising official Tony Estanguet said security was the number one consideration and that the games could not be staged without some disruption, while the International Olympic Committee (IOC) said it was bracing itself for Russia’s revenge at not being invited. Cyber-attacks and disinformation are expected to wash over us all.
Still, the hardy perennials, who have been to an Olympic Games or two, look on the prospect of possible trouble and disruption much like they did the Zica virus in Rio and Covid in Tokyo. The Olympics take place. The races are run. The games are played, and at the end the IOC declare them the best games ever.
There is always some kind of underlying threat, although around Stade de France a few hours before Ireland took to the pitch against South Africa, the approach to security was no more than carefree, flexible.
A lost key ensured the media gate remained locked, so bodies flooded in the nearest entrance, a staff gate, for access to the stadium. Once inside an Irish Times colleague strolled purposefully on to the covered running track, which wraps around the main pitch, to take a photograph of the inside of the empty arena and suck up what it might feel like to be an athlete stepping into an Olympic track and field event.
The Atlanta Olympics in 1996 was a little like that. Strict security was in place one day, then you strolled through the next with no more than a cheery wave. The bus drivers, who came down from New York the previous day, became hopelessly lost. Peachtree then was not so peachy.
We tend to forget that. Aside from an eerily still Tokyo, there is always traffic, always security issues, always disruption when a sporting juggernaut like the Olympic Games comes to town. In that historical tradition Paris is no different. Everyone pays a tariff and hopefully receives a benefit too.
