Paris Olympics fuel gentrification fears in poor district

The 52-hectare (128-acre) area is bustling with trucks, a constant hammering is in the air. It's the final stretch for construction works at the village for the Summer Olympics 2024 which is to be completed by the end of this year.

And these grey, white and red buildings could not only provide a temporary home for the games' 14,500 Olympic and 6,000 Paralympic athletes. Local authorities are hoping the village will also, ultimately, upgrade the department of Seine-Saint-Denis, a Paris suburb and mainland France's poorest area.

But some residents most of all fear the project's negative impact.

"We have worked with 40 architects from around the world to design the city of the 21st Century," says Marion Le Paul, deputy director general at Solideo, the public- sector organisation tasked with financing, supervising and delivering the Olympic facilities.

She noted that construction of the village will cause 47% less CO2 due to the use of wood and low-carbon concrete. Materials are transported by ship which means that 25,000 truck journeys can be avoided.

"We've also been installing geothermal heating and cooling systems in the apartments, that can now go without air conditioning units," she added.

Solideo is investing €1.7 billion ($1.79 billion) in the project. Construction works kicked off in late 2020 with up to 3,000 builders deployed at the site simultaneously.

Four real estate investors — Vinci Immobilier, Icade, Legendre Immobilier and Nexity — are carrying out the works after having bought the premises from the public authorities. After the games, the French companies will remodel and then sell or rent the 2,800 apartments and office area with space for up to 6,000 workers.

Mathieu Hanotin, mayor of the town of Saint-Denis, thinks the new village in town, and other Olympic infrastructure such as a new nearby swimming pool, is "excellent news."

"This project will considerably enhance the value of this area — also as it'll bring us new roads, bridges, anti-noise walls and power lines," he told DW.

Residents worried about air pollution

But Hamid Ouidir is skeptical. The 50-year-old is a member of the so-called Vigilance Committee of the Olympic Games in Saint-Denis that includes local residents.

"We were really happy when we heard the games would come here, but now we feel like we're being steamrollered," he told DW while standing in front of one of the newly constructed buildings.

The father of two young children worries that the area's air quality during and after the games might deteriorate further. "We have carried out measurements over five months and detected that air pollution is constantly above the limit considered safe for the human health. These values are likely to be even worse with the additional inhabitants and traffic," Ouidir explained.

He doubts that four new planned metro connections — only one will be finished on time for the games — will lower air pollution much. "People here will still take their car to work."

Ouidir also refuted the argument that the additionally constructed flats will ease the housing shortage that Saint-Denis, like many other French departments, is experiencing. "The new flats will only increase the number of inhabitants, as people from Saint-Denis can't afford to buy apartments for €7000 per square meter."

But real estate investor Icade says that's not entirely true. The company is constructing and will sell 643 of the village's apartments, 200 of which have just been put on the market for private buyers.

"We've been contacted by interested buyers from Seine-Saint-Denis and other places such as Paris," Icade project manager Florence Chahid-Nourai told DW. "And we're selling at market price – which is obviously higher for newly constructed flats than for older ones."

Seine-Saint-Denis threatened by gentrification

Andrew Zimbalist, professor for economics at Smith College in Northampton in the northeastern US State of Massachusetts, has been looking at practically all Olympic Games — and their villages — since 1986.

"You normally get gentrification of neighborhoods: rents go up and people can no longer afford to live there," he explained to DW.

He added that there were very few examples of Olympic villages that later on increased an area's general welfare.

The village for the Summer Games 1996 in US city of Atlanta could be seen as one – but the project had a downside. "The flats of the Olympic village are now being used as student dormitories," he said. "But to build the village, the developers took over land from very low income communities, kicked them out and knocked down the houses they were living in."

The economist says organizers should take into account so-called opportunity costs of projects. "They need to ask themselves if the public money could be used in a more socially compatible way."

For Ouidir, the answer to that question is yes. "We'd really need a pharmacy and a public health center in the area," he stretched.

However, mayor Hanotin argues that the games can't solve all the area's problems. And he'd welcome some gentrification in Saint-Denis. "The games will attract a more diverse population," he stated. "We currently have 52% of council housing and need more regular flats to attract other population segments."

'Cost overruns in Paris so far moderate'

With the local economic impact somehow debatable, can France at least be sure the games will have a beneficial impact on the economy as a whole?

Not necessarily, opines economist Zimbalist. "The Olympics generally cost between $20 billion (€18.98 billion) and $40 billion but only generate roughly $5 billion of revenue."

However, Wladimir Andreff, professor emeritus for economics at University Paris 1 and president of the Observatory for Sports Economics at France's Sports Ministry, is more optimistic.

"It's true that organizing cities often understate the costs of holding the Olympics — also when bidding to host the games," he told DW, adding that the Winter Olympics in the Russian city of Sochi had cost $50 billion instead of the initially estimated $6 billion. "However, cost overruns in Paris have so far been moderate. France's Court of Auditors estimates the costs have by now only gone up by 30% to €8 billion."

Olympics likely to have one positive effect

The bottom line, though, will only be known in hindsight – and it's complicated, underlines Luc Arrondel, professor for economics at Paris School of Economics. "We have to take into account numerous indirect effects such as for example the fact that the games could improve the image of Seine-Saint-Denis in the eyes of international investors," he told DW.

In his opinion the games are likely to have one positive effect. "Surveys during the London Summer Olympics 2012 have shown that Londoners were feeling a lot happier during the games, especially, of course, when their team won medals."

Edited by: Uwe Hessler