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Entrance of the Métro-Station Concorde in Paris.
Christian Böhmer | Picture Alliance | Getty Images
Tourists are set to pay almost twice the usual price of Paris Metro tickets during the 2024 Olympics and Paralympics that will take place in the French capital from July to September next year.
Single metro journeys will cost 4 euros, said Valerie Pecresse, the president of the Île-de-France region that includes Paris, in a video posted on social media on Tuesday. This is up from a current cost of 2.10 euros.
A so-called Paris 2024 pass will also be launched, Pecresse added.
“We will create a new [transport] pass, the Paris 2024 Pass, that will allow visitors to move across the entire Île-de-France. It will cost 16 euros per day. That is the fair price,” she explained, according to a CNBC translation. The higher prices will be in effect from July 20 to Sept. 8.
Île-de-France Mobilités, the local authority in charge of public transport companies, would increase the transport options available during the Olympics and Paralympics next year, Pecresse said, adding that it was out of the question for local residents to bear the cost.
Locals with monthly or annual public transport passes would be shielded from the price hikes, Pecresse said.
Pecresse’s announcement comes after Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo said last week that the city’s public transport network would not be ready for the Olympics and Paralympics, which are set to bring masses of tourists to the French capital.
The public transport concerns are the latest in a series of questions about whether Paris will be ready for the Olympics — one of them also centering around potentially higher levels of bedbugs in the French capital earlier this year.
Videos that appeared to show bedbugs on the Paris metro, the city’s Charles de Gaulle airport and trains in the country have spread on social media, sparking concerns in early autumn. Fears have since subsided.
Disclosure: CNBC parent NBCUniversal owns NBC Sports and NBC Olympics. NBC Olympics is the U.S. broadcast rights holder to all Summer and Winter Games through 2032.
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