2024-09-07 11:50:59
During a press conference orchestrated this Friday, September 6, 2024, the Mayor of Paris clarified her project concerning the future of the Olympic rings and the Paralympic agitos which will remain in the capital at least until 2028, the deadline for the next Summer Games which will take place in Los Angeles (California, United States).
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AWith the end of the Games approaching, Paris is preparing to close a chapter of festivities that will have marked the summer of 2024 and, more broadly, the contemporary history of the “City of Light”she who has been in search of the Games in recent decades after the last edition organized on site in 1924.
While the repercussions of the 2024 Games will be felt in the months and years to come – whether in the field of tourism or on the economic level – certain aspects of the legacy are already perceptible, such as the urban developments carried out in anticipation of hosting the global event.
To keep the spirit of the Games alive in the capital after 2024, local authorities also intend to maintain at least two symbols of the sporting event in public spaces: the Olympic rings on the one hand and the Paralympic agitos on the other.
View of the Olympic rings on the Eiffel Tower, Tuesday June 11, 2024 (Credits – Sport & Society)
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Currently available on the Eiffel Tower (7th arrondissement) for the first et at the top of the Arc de Triomphe (8th) for the secondthese symbols will remain in Paris after the Games but in a somewhat different configuration.
Thus, while the structure of the Olympic rings arranged between the first and second floors of the « Lady of Iron » must be filed in the coming weeks, first make way for a temporary work on the Pont d’Iénathen then to the installation of rings on the emblematic Parisian building with a weight less than the current nearly 30 tonnesthe Paralympic agitos will leave the top of the Champs-Élysées but will remain located on the most beautiful avenue in the world.
The three Paralympic markers could indeed be enthroned opposite the statue of General de Gaulle, near the metro exit. Champs-Élysées – Clemenceau not far from the Grand Palais (8th arrondissement) which was, during the Games, one of the main competition venues, successively hosting the fencing, taekwondo, then wheelchair fencing and para-taekwondo events, offering spectacular images under the monumental nave of the building.
With such a location, the City of Paris would retain the control over the agitators that the Île-de-France Region had nevertheless wished to obtain, Valérie Pécresse, President of the regional executive and political opponent of the Parisian mayor, proposed at the beginning of the month to install the structure on the facade of the Regional Hotel in Saint-Ouen (Seine-Saint-Denis).
Paralympic agitos on the facade of the Arc de Triomphe in Paris (Credits – Paris 2024 / Tony Esnault and Jeanne Fauvel)
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But with regard to both the Olympic rings and the Paralympic Agitos, Anne Hidalgo was keen to clarify the outlines of a provisional calendar which could be subject to change over time.
During a press conference from the Paris Media Center installed during the Games in the Carreau du Temple (Paris Centre), the Mayor of Paris has indeed mentioned maintaining the works at least until 2028, the year of the next edition of the Summer Games which will then be held in Los Angeles.
As Anne Hidalgo explained on Friday, September 6, 2024, as if to respond to the criticisms that have been expressed in recent days, notably from the descendants of Gustave Eiffel or the resigning Minister of Culture – and main local opponent – Rachida Dati:
Until 2028, that is, until the Los Angeles Games, we will leave them – the rings – on the Eiffel Tower and the agitos on the Champs-Élysées.
This is the proposal we are making. And then in 2028, we will see.
If we still cannot do without these signs, these major symbols that will remind us that this was not just a parenthesis, but that we have rights and duties, maybe after 2028 they will remain, maybe not, we will see..
Anne Hidalgo, Mayor of Paris, in front of the Olympic cauldron for the Paris 2024 Games placed in the Tuileries Gardens (Credits – Henri Garat / City of Paris)
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The Mayor of the capital also took advantage of this meeting with journalists to return to another symbol that has travelled around the world during the Paris 2024 Games: the cauldron and its flame ring above the Tuileries Garden (Paris Centre) near the Louvre Museum.
And Anne Hidalgo already made it known during the summer that she was in favour of preserving the work. imagined by the designer Mathieu Lehanneur – also the originator of the torch and cauldron of the Torch Relays – the decision will come back in fine to the State which owns the land.
As the woman who has been in charge of Paris for a decade now recalled:
The basin is on land that belongs to the State, and we are very, very, very in favour of the basin remaining, of course with changes because it will no longer be able to have the flame that will go out on Sunday evening. [08 septembre 2024].
But the basin must remain. For this, I am ready as Mayor of Paris to join the State’s reflection to determine the conditions for the perpetuation of the basin..
As Pierre Rabadan, Deputy Mayor in charge of Sport, the Olympic and Paralympic Games, and the Seine, subsequently clarified, aware of the technical constraints that could arise regarding the maintenance of the cauldron:
It’s a massive popular success with an average of 15,000 people going to see it every night. Decisions have to be made quickly.
The Mayor wrote to the President of the Republic.
Our wish is that it stays where it is with modalities of evolution because it cannot remain lit. And we do not necessarily wish that it rises every night..
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