Memoire Online - Le Grand Paris. How would this project generate an economic growth?

L'Ecole n'entend donner aucune approbation ni improbation aux opinions émises dans les Projets de Fin d'Etudes. Ces opinions doivent être considérées comme propres à leurs auteurs.

Motivations et Remerciements

Originaire de l'agglomération de Cergy-Pontoise, l'aménagement de la région Ile-de-France est une notion qui m'est familière. Beaucoup de personnes de mon entourage pourront attester de mon attachement à cette ville nouvelle.

Etant fortement attiré par les sujets à enjeux économiques, politiques et urbanistiques, je me suis naturellement orienté vers un mémoire de fin d'étude portant sur le sujet du Grand Paris.

J'ai pu, grâce à ce mémoire, découvrir des articles, des recherches qui m'ont réellement captivé. Néanmoins étant étudiant en école de commerce au sein d'une spécialité marketing, mes connaissances académiques concernant le développement économique territorial, l'urbanisme ou la macroéconomie ont rapidement été mises à rude épreuve !

C'est pour cette raison, que je tiens à remercier mes sept interlocuteurs qui ont eu la patience et la gentillesse de répondre à mon questionnaire. Je remercie donc Laurent Bach, Jean-Paul Chapon, Anthony Crenn, Roxanne Dugenetay, Thierry Galeron, Georges Meitg and Florent Riveron pour leur aide si précieuse.

Je remercie aussi Monsieur Safwan Mchawrab, professeur de finance au sein de Reims Management School, pour ses conseils et son soutien permanent.

A-c Example of London		18-21
A-d Example of Berlin		21-23
B - Why the Greater Paris		23-34
B-a Definition of the problem of Paris Ile-de-France: challenges and benefits for the future		23-28
B-b Demand of the President Sarkozy		28-32
B-c The legal status of «Grand Paris»		32-33
C - How this project could create an economic growth		33-40
C-a Keynes theory		33-35
C-b Classical theory		35-38
Hypothesis 1: The Greater Paris is not part of the European economic model		38-40
D-Projects proposed for the Greater Paris		40-63
D-a Public transports projects		40-43
D-b Expected impact from transports		43-49
Nicolas Saouaf Le Grand Paris Mémoire 2011
Hypothesis 2: Transports investment will be the main improvement on the economy	49-51
D-c Environmental projects	51-52
Hypothesis 3: The Greater Paris project is not a generator for the Green economy	52-57
D-e IT and R&d development in the Greater Paris	57-58
Hypothesis 4: Greater Paris: Incubator of IT and R&D	58-63
E - Analysis and discussion of the results	63-68
E-a Methodology	63
E-b Analysis	63-67
E-c Discussion	67-68
Conclusion	69
Sources	70-72

Extrait

Le Grand Paris est le projet économique le plus important des dernières décennies de la région Paris Ile-de-France. En effet, depuis la création des Villes Nouvelles dans les années 60-70, la région capitale française a été nettement moins active que ses concurrentes européennes comme Londres, Berlin où Milan.

Le projet du Grand Paris à pour objectif de moderniser la ville et la région, afin d'engendrer une forte croissance économique. Une question semble donc évidente : comment ce projet du Grand Paris pourrait générer une croissance économique?

Pour répondre à cette question, il sera primordial d'analyser le projet principal du Grand Paris: la création d'une ligne de métro automatique autour de la ville. Pout étayer cette analyse sur la croissance économique attendue, nous avons aussi analysé les différents projets proposés aux gouvernements par dix agences d'architecture (ces projets sont toujours à l'étude au sein du gouvernement et de la région).

Ces analyses sont composées de recherches académiques visant à montrer l'impact d'investissements sur les transports, les parcs scientifiques ou l'économie « verte ».

Le projet du Grand Paris couvrant un grand nombre de problématiques, ce document est composé d'une multitude de sujets tels que la macroéconomie, l'urbanisme, le droit, l'architecture, le marketing territorial ou le développement des nouvelles technologies.

A partir de ces thèmes, quatre hypothèses ont été formulées. En effet, grâce à la collecte de documents universitaires, ces hypothèses ont été formulées et discutées par sept spécialistes afin de les valider ou les invalider.

Abstract

The Greater Paris has been the most important economic plan of the last decades for the region Paris Ile-de-France. Indeed since the creation of the villes nouvelles in the 60's-70's, the French capital region has been definitely less active than its European competitors as London, Berlin, or Milan.

The Grand Paris project is the creation of different projects to modernize the city and the region to generate a stronger economic growth than the current one. The natural question regarding this issue would be: How would this Grand Paris project generate an economic growth?

To answer at this question it will be primordial to analyze the main project of Le Grand Paris: the creation of an automatic tube line around the city. To be more complete about the eventual economic growth expected, the paper also analyzes the different projects proposed to governments by ten architecture agencies.

These analyzes are composed by academic researches demonstrating impact of investment transports, Science parks or Green clusters.

Indeed, as the Greater Paris project covers many issues, this document is composed by a multitude of topics such as macroeconomics, urbanism, law, architecture, territorial marketing or IT.

From these topics, four hypotheses have been formulated. Indeed, due to the academic papers collected, these hypotheses have been formulated and discussed by seven specialists of the topic in order to validate or invalidate them.

INTRODUCTION

On June 27, 2007 at the inauguration of Roissy 3, President Nicolas Sarkozy gave a speech in which he places a clear message: "the state can do without having a vision and strategy for the region economically most powerful in Europe, which generates 28% of the national wealth of our country? I do not think so. The president therefore wishes to mobilize the various jurisdictions to define a development plan for the Ile-de-France.

On 1 December 2009, by 299 votes against 216 MPs adopted the bill on the Greater Paris¹, this law has resulted in the creation of a League of Greater Paris (its mission is to build a metro system around Paris). This law has marked the real start of construction of this project.

Indeed this can be taken as a good example of government expenditure. In France, public investments are done by three institutions: Central administration (the state itself), local collectivities (regions, departments, cities), and health care security. These three administrations realized investment expenses as schools, hospitals, airports, or roads in order to provide or improve to the citizens. This approach is considered as part of the Keynesian in order to reflate the economy of the country (by creating some works, and facilitating the economic environment because of the new construction). The French governments have since the 50's always used these economic theories in order to grow the GDP during «les 30 glorieuses», or to maintain a growth during les «20 piteuses» since the 80's. One of the main purpose of these investments is to promote the business of the companies.

One more time, through the Grand Paris project, the French government uses the Keynesian theory in order to improve the French economic competitiveness. Indeed, the French government wants to renovate the infrastructures of Paris Ile-de France region. To do so, on September 17, 2007 President Sarkozy called ten agencies Architecture and urban development will be assigned to work on the overall development of Greater Paris. They have been asked to think of the new Paris in terms of architecture, economics (green business), and infrastructures (public transports), in order to have a megalopolis ready to compete with the others main cities in the world (New York City, London, Tokyo, Beijing or Sidney). Ten architecture agencies have answered to this demand, each proposing a project to the region.

To analyze this topic, we will use the following problematic: How would this Grand Paris poject
generate an economic growth? How a public investment can promote the trade of Francilienne crosses

to the ten studies made? What are the tools which will permit to generate an economic growth? What aspects have been forgotten in the Grand Paris project plan?

Indeed it will be interesting to analyze beside the political speech, what could the Greater Paris project brings to the Paris Ile de France economy.

To analyze this question, we will first understand what the actual situation of the agglomeration is; in a second time we will analyze why the Greater Paris is essential for the future of the region; in a third time will analyze in which sense such a project can create an economic growth; in a fourth time we will analyze the different projects proposed; and to finish we will analyze our research with a qualitative approach.

A-Paris : A global city

A-a Historical context of Paris Ile-de-France

Ile-de-France region was born at the tenth century by the Capetian dynasty (the oldest royal house of Europe), which were a Frank dynasty. The historical growth of Paris can be measured by the growth of the Paris' confines. They have been fortified by Philippe Auguste at the 12^th century, at the 14^th century by Charles V. The real urbanisation of Paris started with Louis XIV, and an administration was established at the end of the 18^th century (Fermiers Généraux). The borders of Paris have a strong historical and social significance, as «la commune de Paris» in 1860 illustrates perfectly this point².

From an historical point of view, this history of Paris explains why the city had a concentric growth over the years. Indeed, the borders of Paris have been designed in order to be able to defend the city by including every part urbanized. The actual administrative borders of Paris have not changed since 1860 (year of the last enlargement of Paris, with the incorporation of town such as Montmartre)³.

According to Pierre Pinon, the real engine which permits to Paris to grow has always been the same: Paris is the capital. But since the beginning of the 20^th century, a problem has raised. Indeed it is noticed that the administrative limits of the capital do not fit with the real situation⁴. The urbanisation strongly grew around Paris, without being considered as part of the city, which creates a discrepancy between the city and its administrative power.

Nevertheless, the legal power at this time created in 1910 a commission focused on the extension of the city («Commission d'Extension de Paris»). In 1919, a law concerning the urban redevelopment of Paris was adopted. From this point many plans have been proposed to the authorities in order to improve the situation of Paris⁵. In 1919, Léon Jaussely won the first price on the development of the region of Paris. Indeed this famous architect from Toulouse⁶ proposed a plan which aimed to report out of Paris, every building, institutions with a function not considered as primordial in the city centre. Indeed, industrial equipments, housing areas, or universities would have to be sent in the periphery. This is according to P. Pinon, a zone strategy rather than a mixed strategy (which can be compared to the Taylorism practice by specialising every area to a simple function).

² P.Pinon, 2009, Le Grand Pari(s), Consultation internationale sur l'avenir de la métropole Parisienne, PP.15.

⁶ Zieseniss Ch. O. Les projets d'aménagement de la région parisienne. In: Annales de Géographie. 1940, t. 49, n^°277. PP. 28-34.

Because of this law of urban redevelopment, 81 cities were concerned (all cities from the old department named «Seine», which nowadays mainly represent «la petite couronne»). A departmental office was in charge to manage the different plans which were going to be established in the towns⁷.

But in 1928, Raymond Poincarré decided to bring up the development of Paris on a national stage. The government at this time, through Mr Albert Sarrault (minister of the interior), created a comity for the overall organisation of the Parisian region («Comité supérieur de l'aménagement et de l'organisation générale de la region Parisienne»).

The 14^th of May 1932 has seen the promulgation of a new law for the redevelopment of the Region of Paris. The break of this law was the legal establishment of the region, which was composed by three departments: Seine, Seine-et-Oise and Seine-et-Marne. Geographically speaking, it does correspond to a radius of 25 kilometres around the centre of Paris. The law gave the impulsion to embellish the towns located in the area and an also stimulate an extension of them⁸.

The plan of this urban redevelopment was concerning at this time 656 towns. In practical terms, the plan was to improve (or creates) road to connect the towns, but also to be sure that all these towns were provided in water, and would ensure the building of sewer, creation of schools, post offices, police stations or even garbage collector services. These actions aimed to develop economically these towns, and also to attract more people to release the city centre. The government scheduled this development on a 15 years scale, thinking it would leave enough time to the different city councils to create or improve all these services in order to meet with these imposed standards⁹.

Nevertheless, as the author of «Les projets d'aménagement de la region Parisienne» wrote in 1940, the plan of the government has not been implemented quickly in the region, and the constructions have been delayed for different reasons (budget problems, but also the Second World War)¹⁰.

Nevertheless, this project really implemented the impulsion to improve Paris. In 1956, new laws aim to continue the urban redevelopment plans have been studied by the different institution still in this goal to release the city centre and improve the organisation of the region. The new idea is to create modern housing estate («Grands ensembles») in order to limit the extension of the suburbs, provide more housing to the population, responding to some higher quality norms. Some cities such as La

¹⁰ Zieseniss Ch. O. Les projets d'aménagement de la région parisienne. In: Annales de Géographie. 1940, t. 49, n77. PP.34.

Courneuve (Seine Saint-Denis department) or Sarcelles (Val d'Oise department) represent perfectly this politic¹¹ followed at this period.

In 1960's, President De Gaulle asked Paul Delouvrier (Director of the District of Paris), to organize the region of Paris considered as real «mess» by the president. In 1965, Paul Delouvrier launched the project of the new cities. Indeed, by developing cities relatively far away from the centre, it would settle new urban centres (in term of animation, culture, economy). Nowadays, we can still contemplate the results of this politic as the new cities Cergy-Pontoise, Marne-la-Vallée, Mélun-Sénart, Evry and Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines¹² symbolize this stage of construction.

Indeed the creation of these new cities mainly changed the system of the region. Indeed, they lead to the improvement of the RER (Réseau Express Régional) as it is mentioned in the Schema of the Ile-de-France region of 1994.¹³

Indeed the region focused on the improvement of the public transport in order to reduce the traffic going into the city, to result a better impact on the environment.

When we look back on these different urban plans, we can consider them as having a really positive influence on the region overall.

Indeed, the implementation of Disney Land Paris in Marne-la Valée, which attracted 14,5 millions of visitors in 2007 (which makes this touristic site as the visitors' main reason to go to Seine-et-Marne department)¹⁴ generates 49000 jobs¹⁵.

On the other hand one of the new cities objectives was to constraint the extension the urban growth, which actually did not work. Indeed as mentioned by Pierre Pinnon, the urban extension reached the new cities, which means that the growth of the city kept coming from the centre¹⁶, there is still a densification of the entire region.

Moreover, we might notice many projects which have been delayed or give up by the region, and
would have been useful for the economical situation. By looking to the region development plans

¹² Loïc Vadelorge, Mémoire et histoire : Les villes nouvelles françaises, 2005, n°98, PP.6-13.

¹⁶ P.Pinon, 2009, Le Grand Pari(s), Consultation internationale sur l'avenir de la métropole Parisienne, PP.17

archives of 1994, the creation of RER line F in the department of Val d'oise¹⁷ was supposed to be built two decades ago. Unfortunately, this project was abandoned because of budget restriction and the lack of political implication in this project. Recently an eventual creation of a line F still creates a debate.

All this history permits to understand the actual situation of Paris. Indeed its economic and industrial repartition shows the social inequality repartition within the region, and the creation of new city centres which have obviously some benefits for the economy have also highlight the limits of massive construction efficiency. As we can assume, the concentric problem of Paris is not a new issue, and many plans have failed so far. Many observatories have claimed the use of space of the region as totally inefficient.

b-The actual economic situation of Paris Ile-de-France

Paris Ile-de-France is one of the richest areas in the world. Indeed in 2007, only the cities of Tokyo, Los Angles and New York were having a greater GDP. By comparison, in 2003, the GDP of the region was about $513 billion, which represented at that time about 40% of the Chinese one or a bit more than 100% of the Dutch GDP¹⁸. Paris has a significant place within the EU27, as its GDP represents 4.7% of the European GDP (28.9% of the domestic GDP) in 2009¹⁹.

Paris is the biggest European region in term of inhabitants, as it represents 11.8 million people in 2009. Paris Ile-de-France population weights for 2.3% of the EU-27 population (and 18.2% of the French one). Nevertheless, the region is ranked only at the twenty-first place in term of density (978 inhabitants per sq.km), the most densified region being Brussels (6.512 inhabitants per sq. Km)²⁰

Its exportations represent € 55.7 million in 2009, while its importations were about €105.6 million. The main products in 2009 exported were pharmaceutical goods (7%) and automotive manufacturing products (6%). Concerning the Parisian importations, they are mainly automotive manufacturing products (14%) and natural hydrocarbons (11%). European Union members represented, in 2009, about half of the value of the Parisian foreign trade (45% of the exportations, and 58% of the total imports), nevertheless the USA are still the best client of Parisian companies (11% of total exports), its main supplier being Germany (15% of total imports)²¹.

¹⁸ Laurent Davezies, Croissance sans développement en Ile-de-France, OEil-Créteil-Université Paris 12, 2007, PP. 1

¹⁹ Paris Region Economic development agency, Paris Region Key Figures, 2011, PP.6

²¹ Paris Region Economic development agency, Paris Region Key Figures, 2011, PP.19

Still in 2009, 814.600 businesses belonged to the region (130.500 created that year), in 2008, 5.957.000 people were working in the region (salaried and non salaried). Moreover, compare to the others important region of Europe, Paris is also well positioned in term of unemployment rate (8.4%), as it is just below the EU-27 average rate (8.9%), London (8.4%), Madrid (14.0%) or Brussels (15.7%)²².

It is important to notice that Paris is also the European region number one regarding the rate of jobs created by Foreign Direct Investment. Indeed in 2009, 17.500 establishments were subsidiaries of international groups, which represent 15% of the total employment of the region. It is also interesting to precise that during the period 2003 to 2009, the Foreign Direct Investments grew by 60% in the region. In 2009, Japan was the most important origin country by representing 20% of jobs created by FDI (before the USA)²³.

As the origins of companies composing the region of Paris, the economic structure of Paris is also really diversified. Indeed, if we first analyzed the size of the firms composing Ile-de-France region, it is obvious to assume that the Paris' economy is mainly composed by Very small size enterprises (1 to 9 employees) as they represent 93% of the companies (696.121 companies). Small and medium size enterprises (10 to 249 employees) represent 7% (52.659), intermediate size companies (250 to 5000) represent 0.4% (3.212), and finally the large companies (over 5000 employees) represent 0.002% of the total companies present in the region (135). Regarding the top ranked companies in Paris Ile-de-France, La poste is the first employer of the region (56.600 employees), before Air France (52.100 employees) and SNCF (51.900 employees)²⁴.

The companies present in Paris area are mainly working on the third sector (87.2%), the second sector represents 12.2% and the first sector 0.7%. The following graph shows the total value and the percentage representation of each sector in the Parisian economy:

²³ Paris Region Economic development agency, Paris Region Key Figures, 2011, PP.19

This diversification of activities sector is a real strength for the region, in order to attract new investors. Indeed according to Ernst & Young survey of 2009 «Reinventing European growth», it is assumed that investors, are more confident to invest in global cities, as they are culturally diversified, with different activities sectors. Indeed, still according to Ernst & Young, these global cities are more likely to recover from an economic crisis. Even if this survey shows a large domination of New York and London, Paris is still considered by 113 out of 809 international business leaders as the best city in the world able to rebound in a crisis context²⁶.

²⁵ Ernst and Young, Reinventing European growth, 2009, P.P 33 ²⁶Ibid, 2009, P.P 33

²⁷Figure 2 : Global cities that have the best ability to rebound in a crisis context

Indeed Paris region represents many advantages regarding to its economic structure. Regarding public and private expenditure, €16.4 billion have been spent in R&D in 2008 (Vs. €15.8 billion in 2007) which ranks Paris on the top of European regions in term of investment research (which represents 143,800 workers). Indeed, by splitting up this amount into public and private, we see that private expenditure largely dominates the total money spent (€10.7 billion out €16.4 billion including 86.900 employees), while public research spent €5.7 billion (representing 57.900 employees)²⁸.

In 2010, Paris Ile-de-France defined nine competitiveness clusters (they were all the result of a strategy launched in 2005 by the government to gather companies work, research centres and training bodies). These nine competitiveness clusters were organized through nine different entities: Advancity, ASTech, Cap Digital, Cosmetic Valley, Elastopole, Finance Innovation, Medicen, Mov'eo and Systematic. In 2010, this strategy can be credited of 1000 projects financed, which represent €3.210 million (€1.230 million were from public funds).

²⁸ Paris Region Economic development agency, Paris Region Key Figures, 2011, PP.13

Paris is more advanced in term of sustainable development compare to the others major cities in the world, in 2010 97 projects were financed by public funds (€87 million Euros out the total investment of €200 million).

The second competitiveness cluster of Paris is named ASTech, and concerns the business of aviation, and space transportation (EADS is implemented in the region of Paris, and its space transportation based in the town of Les Mureaux).

The sector of digital content technologies is also really important in the region of Paris, as €600 million have been invested in the different projects concerning this sector (€275 million were from public funds), and is ranked as the first sector in term of number of projects in which the region invested in (300 projects out a total of 1.032 projects).

Ile-de-France region is also considered in the world as one of the most advanced in cosmetic. Indeed with many companies leading on this sector on the global scale (L'Oréal, Pierre Fabre or LVMH), the region can be considered as a cosmetic valley (in 2010, €110 million were invested in this sector).

The fourth sector composing the nine clusters is the research of rubber and polymer, with a total investment of €23 million.

Paris also insists on the development of the financial sector within its borders (through the creation of Finance Innovation). Indeed, the different sectors concerning the financial markets (banks, investment companies, insurance, investment management, or any other services related to the financial sectors), have benefit of an investment of €17 million for 12 projects of research.

The seventh entity (Medicen Paris Region) is working on the innovative therapies and advanced technologies in healthcare).This sector represents an investment of €330 million (€157 million was invested by the region).

Regarding the importance of French car industry on the economy, it seems logical to see the different investments done on the automotive sector, public transport, road and also the environment (this sector represents the second biggest investment in value (€700 millions, public investment represent €190 million of this amount).

The last and ninth entity created (Systematic Paris Region), concerns many sectors (free and open source software, security and defense, telecom), and represents by far the most important part of the total investment (€1.100 million, with a public investment of €420 million)²⁹.

Regarding to these investment amounts, we can easily see the interest of the region to mainly focus on
systemic topics, by financing researches in IT sector, as it is a growing market which can generate an

²⁹ Paris Region Economic development agency, Paris Region Key Figures, 2011, PP.13

economic growth to the entire economy. It is also clear that the region wants to be considered as the leading global city in term of «Green» practices and sustainability. Indeed this «new» market is considered as an essential economic generator by Paris Ile-de-France, which wants to be considered as one of the first mover.

In 2001, Porter explained the influence of the territory on the innovation trend. Indeed he explained that some regions will be able to offer a high level of innovation in a specific domain, and a low level of innovation in others domains. Porter explains these differences because of the location, the history, the culture which all impact the economic clusters of the cities³⁰.

Kotler qualify this specialization in certain sector of the economy as essential for a city in order to be attractive, to become more competitive regarding to this sector of activity, and generate more attractiveness to the foreign investors³¹.

Nevertheless, Paris region knows many difficulties in term of structure, which weakens Paris in the competition of the global cities. In Europe for instance, a strong and old battle with London has shown the advantages but also the limits of Paris in this competition. Berlin is also becoming an important competitor to Paris on the European cities battle.

A-c Example of London

London is considered as the main competitor of Paris. Indeed, as the French model, the United Kingdom has a centralized system, where all the important functions of the country are located in London (by comparison Germany has many middle cites, Italy has its economic functions based in Milan and the politic power in Rome).

³⁰ Porter M. E. et Stern S. « Innovation: Location Matters», MIT Sloan Management Review n° 4, 2001, P.P. 28 to 37

³¹ Kotler P. « There's no place like our place! The marketing of cities, regions, and nation »The Futurist, Nov/Dec 1993, volume 27, n° 6; P.P. 14 to 21. cited by Proulx , Tremblay , « Marketing territorial et positionnement mondial » Global positioning of the peripheries with territorial marketing,Géographie, économie, société, 2006/2 Vol. 8, p. 243.

This explains the good positioning of Paris and London, considered as the two major cities of Europe. Nevertheless we can analyze London as more advanced in term of organization, as the government has started to create a competitive city a long time ago.

Indeed from 1984 to 2000, the public transports of London were directly managed by the central government. In 2000 only, Londoners have been able to vote for the Greater London Authority in order to give to this institution the power to manage the public transports of London (through its authority Transport For London)³³. This changing was one of the major projects of Tony Blair.

The Greater London Authority has obtained its legal status through the GLA act voted in 1999. It gives the function to this institution to develop the urban area of London in term of transports, environment and urbanization.

³³ Juan Pablo Bocarejo, «Evaluation économique de l'impact des politiques publiques liées à la mobilité, les cas de Paris, Londres, Bogota et Santiago. », November 2008, P.P.55

The organization system is clear: GLA has to deal with the different Boroughs composing London and also with the government in order to implement actions (obviously these actions have to respect the global strategy of London)³⁴.

The public transports lines of London are exploited by private companies since 1984 (result of the Thatcher government). Indeed the Greater London Authority and Transports For London are in charge of controlling the respect of laws by the private companies such as materials, itinerary, price (which is not the case in the rest of the country)³⁵. Transports For London also directly manages the highways of the Greater London, the institution is allowed to perceive some money from the users (vehicles which want to access to the city centre are charged).

Since 2003, TFL is also in charge of London Underground (before the British government was in charge of it), and supervises the operation of the stations by private companies (cleaning and technical issues). TFL decides the price of the journeys. But since 1998, a plan public private partnership has been set up to privatize the infrastructures (TFL would be sill the operator, but the lines would be privatize)³⁶.

This system of public private partnership has generated some damages about the good functioning of the public transports. First it has been difficult to establish fares, as differences between the bus fares and the underground fares are observed. Bus fares can be compared to others big cities such as Paris or New York, but the underground fares are about 50% more expansive than in these two other cities.

Nevertheless, according to these observations, we can already see that London has a much better organization than Paris. Indeed, the city had the opportunity for already more than ten years to develop a strategy in order to develop the city efficiently. The government and the Great London authority think and communicate the global approach which is applied by the boroughs.

Contrary to Paris mayor, the London mayor (Boris Johnson), govern the entire area of London (inner
London and the suburbs) which gives him the power to take decisions for 7.4 million people³⁷ (by
comparison the urban area of Paris is governed by 1281 mayors³⁸. All the boroughs depend of the

³⁴ Juan Pablo Bocarejo, «Evaluation économique de l'impact des politiques publiques liées à la mobilité, les cas de Paris, Londres, Bogota et Santiago. », November 2008, P.P.56

central city hall, except for the business district of London (City of London), which has its own administration. This gives a better position to the city to apply a global strategy, with less restriction.

As we have seen London has started to simplify its administration decisions, and clarify its economic strategic growth. It seems to be a city which understood earlier the globalization opportunities. Tony Travers (director of the Greater London group at the London School of Economics), in an interview given to «the economist», declared that «London has flourished not because it has sorted out its transport, or its city management, but because it opened its borders». Indeed, London is commonly called the «global city», which can seem really attractive to companies and employees from everywhere in the world to implement themselves in the United Kingdom's capital.

Indeed, by opening its borders, London has attracted many high qualified people, which gives a strong advantage to the city (nearly 700.000 extra foreign-born live in London since 1997³⁹).

A-d Example of Berlin

Because of historical reasons, we can see a gap between Paris, London and Berlin. Indeed, because of the soviet domination, the city has been unified in 1989, and until today discordance between western and Eastern Berlin can be notified. The city suffers of a large debt and also a strong unemployment rate.⁴⁰

Berlin is a city-state representing one of the sixteen German «Lander». The city represents 896 Km², with 3,4 million inhabitants. The city is governed by an institution named «Gross Berlin» which obtained its legal status in 1920 (Gross Berlin Act).

Klaus Wowereit, actual mayor-governor of Berlin is elected by deputies of Berlin. Gross Berlin Act gives him a power on the urban development of the city, the economic decisions, the cultural actions, security, work issues, teaching area). As in London, all the decisions are centralized to the central power of Berlin⁴².

The transports are managed by the city council of Berlin: Verkehrsverbund (VBB) which ensures the public transports in the German capital. VBB is in charge of fares and operation of the transports.

The institution in charge of the development economic is named «Berlin Partner» and has the objective to work on the territorial marketing, to attract foreign Direct Investment. Berlin Partner is financed by the city and 160 companies⁴³.

As we have already seen, the Gross Berlin is not competitive yet regarding Paris and London infrastructures. Nevertheless the city is growing fast, and its good localization between western and Eastern Europe makes Berlin a strategic place to be.

Also the fact to be the political capital of Germany (richest country of Europe), gives even more importance to the city. Its legal structure (Gross Berlin Act), is still nowadays a great organization in order to move fast. As in London most of the decisions are centralized for the entire region, which gives the possibility to adapt a global strategy easily.

This centralized power for the entire region is crucial. Berlin and London have much more advantages regarding this issue than Paris which is divided between every small suburban town. Paris has to be more adapted to the current global economy, with the capacity to change fast, which is the principal lack of the French capital regarding its two best European rivals.

B-Why the Greater Paris

b-a Definition of the problems of Paris Ile-de-France: challenges and benefits for the future

Paris Ile-de-France has an industry with many firms with strong added value, even though the different fields are not really diversified. The challenge for the region will be to help these companies to renew their industry⁴⁴.

The region should also have a policy to attract the different global companies to implement offices. Indeed, Paris needs to offer many facilities, in order to be an attractive place to establish a business in. Because of the new coming of Eastern countries within the European Union, the city-region should expand its offer, by creating new facilities to keep the prices low and be competitive. Indeed countries as Poland are now important members in the EU, because of their size, and also for its closeness to Germany (major economy of Europe). The new member states can offer facilities really competitive regarding to the cost, this is why western cities, really have to work on their facilities offers⁴⁵.

London is now ranked as the first financial place in the world, which gives to the city many economic advantages. The evolution of the Paris Stock Exchange is also one of the main challenges for the region in order to become more competitive and attractive. Paris Stock Exchange has been established in 1724, and was the second largest stock market just before the First World War (behind London, but in front of New York and Berlin). Nowadays Paris stock market is considered as powerful due to Euronext and its merger with NYSE in 2007 (with an estimated capitalisation of $1.362 billion). The financial sector can be considered as essential for the global cities such as Paris. Even though while the finance sector represents 11% of employment in New York and London, it does only represent 6.5% in Paris (and 4.5% in France). The region has the challenge to create more jobs in this field. At the moment a large number of the French students with a financial formation go to work to London or

⁴⁴ Chambre de commerce et d'industrie de Paris, « Quelle ambition pour l'économie Parisienne ? »,CCI Paris, 2008. P.P.28

even New York. Paris Ile-de-France should be able to bring them back by improving the Parisian financial environment to generate attractive careers. To do so, Paris should also work on its legal and fiscal aspects, by pressuring the government to adapt its fiscal policies⁴⁶ and become more competitive.

Indeed, the following exhibit shows a comparison of the company tax rate in France, Germany, the United Kingdom and Italy:

As we can see, the French corporate tax is the highest of the four countries, as the rate meets nearly 36% of the benefits distributed by the companies in 2002, the lowest rate being in Germany with 26% (ten points under the French one). The companies also have this feeling has it is shown on the Ernst & Young survey of 2003, as only 3% of the companies asked estimate the French tax policy as attractive (against 33% of the companies asked in the United Kingdom)⁴⁸.

Another point really important to improve the situation of Paris is the public transport services. Indeed, as mentioned in the report of Chambre de commerce et d'industrie de Paris (2008). The report highlights the necessity to improve the link between the airport and the city centre, and also to improve the different connections between the suburban towns around Paris⁴⁹.

⁴⁶ Pierre-Cyrille Hautcoeur, Maude Sainteville, « Paris, métropole financière : quels enjeux pour le développement durable ? », Paris, métropole durable, 2009, P.P. 2-9.

⁴⁷ Banque de France, « L'attractivité de la France au travers d'une sélection d'indicateurs », Bulletin De la banque de France, Mars 2004, P.P 82.

The following graph is showing the existing infrastructures of Paris Ile-de-France. As we can notice, the suburb is well connected to the centre, but there is a lack of connection between suburban towns. Also, the main airport of Paris, do not have a permanent direct line, connecting the airport to the city centre (Heathrow London main airport, has a fast line named Heathrow express to reach the city centre from the airport within ten minutes). It is also clear, that the creation of a direct line to connect Paris CDG to the main business area Paris-La Défense is essential.

Indeed, many researchers have shown the importance of transports to the economic growth..

According to Cambridge Systematics and the Economic development agency, Transportations represents 17% of the US Growth Domestic Product, and is the second most important spend of American families (18% of the expenditures). The research highlights also the congestion effects, which are qualified as really costly, it represented in the USA (1999) a scale of $40 to $100 billion per year, as it increased costs and reduce business profitability and strongly decreased the economic attractiveness of the country. The lack of transportation linkage also strongly affects environmental and quality of life of the different workers using the transports, in term of access to work, but also a

⁴⁹ Chambre de commerce et d'industrie de Paris, « Quelle ambition pour l'économie Parisienne ? », 2008. P.P 22

⁵⁰ Paris Region Economic development agency, Paris Region Key Figures, 2011, PP.22

lack of transportation services, and traffic strongly increases the prices, which is also a lack of business competitiveness⁵¹.

As shown, the transportations have a strong impact on the overall economy. In the study of Cambridge systematic and Economic Development Research Group, the theory of Direct Dollar Effects and Multipliers are explained.

«Direct» investment directly impacts the economy, by creating jobs in order to build a transportation project. An investment does also have an «Indirect» effect by spending money to suppliers which provide goods and raw materials. These two investment types will create a growth of the incomes of the households by creating revenues on a permanent term as theses project will be a generator of hiring in order to support the operations on the projects. The raise of transportation projects can also generate on the long term an economy of scale, which will also benefits to the users⁵².

The combination of these spending will do a «multiplier effect», which in practical terms means the stimulation of the economy by generating the creation of new businesses, the expansion of existing businesses and will give more attractiveness to the city/region/country for Foreign Direct Investment.

The general findings of Cambridge systematic are that the transit investment, decreased travel time, decreases the congestion and increase safety for people. These factors generate a decrease of transportation costs which lead to a decrease of business costs, and also a decrease of the cost of living. On a personal life of employee point of view, as the reduction of the journey time to work decreased, it leads to a better productivity at work, so we can assume that it lowers the prices and costs of company's production which leads to a better positioning of the companies in the area concerned by

⁵¹ Cambridge Systematic and Economic Development Research Group, « Public Transportation and the Nation's Economy », Business Members of the American Public Transit Association, 1999, P.P 7

the transit investment to be more willing to trade off with foreign companies. As it stipulates in the article, there is an economic simulation (business expansion and attraction). The government will also thanks to its investment get some tax benefits, as the amounts which will be perceived will be higher (sales taxes, income taxes and property taxes)⁵⁴.

Indeed it has been analysed in the report of Cambridge systematic, that on a short run, $10 million invested would generate 314 jobs, and companies would perceived a gain three times more important than the investment (in this example, a $10 million in transit investment would generate a gain of $30 million of sales)⁵⁵. The research also mentions that every $10 million invested, will permit to save $15 million in transportation costs for all the public transports users⁵⁶.

The challenge here for Paris Ile-de-France is really clear, by investing in public transportations and circulation structures, it will lead to improve of the international sales of the Parisians companies. The region should also have some benefits regarding to the attraction of companies to the region, by creating some jobs and increasing taxes.

Regarding to the results of the research paper, a transit investment can strongly stimulate the economy. If we adapt this simulation to the case of le Grand Paris, the results are also really optimistic. Indeed with an investment of €22 billion of Euros to expand the public transports in the Grand Paris project, it would generate 690800 jobs, companies should gain €66 billion in sales, and the users would save €33 billion.

Obviously these results are not realistic, as the study cannot be applied seriously to our case. Nevertheless it gives an idea of how important could be the Grand Paris project for the region's welfare.

As mentioned in the report of Chambre de commerce et d'industrie de Paris, Paris has to reinforce its attractiveness thanks to its emblematic sectors⁵⁷. The agency proposed different ideas such as the creation of a slogan, as territorial marketing is seen as one of the major aspects to reinforce the city position in the world competition (ex: New York has its famous slogan «I love New York»).

The agency proposes to give a more important role to the mayor of Paris (by comparison the mayors
of New York and London are more mediatised). He could become a real ambassador of the city/region

⁵⁴ Cambridge Systematic and Economic Development Research Group, « Public Transportation and the Nation's Economy », P.P. 7

⁵⁷ Chambre de commerce et d'industrie de Paris, « Quelle ambition pour l'économie Parisienne ? », 2008. P.P 54

in the world. Paris should also build buildings done by famous architects, as it is also an important vector of communication. Indeed at the moment even with all the strengths that the city proposed, we can easily see an unfair under estimation of Paris economics certainly because of a lack of visibility. A simple example to show this issue is to measure the visibility of the Paris economics figures on internet: by looking for «Paris economy» on a web site browser, only 72 web sites talking about are found against 1659 for London. This is explained by the uninteresting of the economists for the region⁵⁸.

B-b The demand of the President Sarkozy.

Nicolas Sarkozy announced the 17^th September 2007, ten prestigious agencies of architecture had to work on the project of Grand Paris⁵⁹ to start the symbolic construction of the Greater Paris. The 29^th of April 2009, the president Nicolas Sarkozy made a new elocution about the Great Paris, with the analyses of the ten agencies to figure out the issues of Paris.⁶⁰

According to the president, France is the first country in the world to think about the metropolis of the future. Paris has to give an impulsion to the world to ensure the post-kyoto time by changing the cities, to become more bearable to the populations «the city is made to fit to the populations; populations are not done to fit with the city»⁶¹.

The topic of Paris according to the president is to know how our big metropolis can have a new prosperity, by being eco-friendly, with more social fairness. On a political point of view, the reflexion on the Greater Paris has to be multi-political parties because the topic is not ideological but practical.

During its elocution, Nicolas Sarkozy insisted on the essentiality for a city/region to be architectural pleasant, as it gives an essential bliss to the inhabitants⁶² which is considered as an indispensable factor.

⁵⁸ Laurent Davezies, Croissance sans développement en Ile-de-France, OEil-Créteil-Université Paris 12, 2007, PP. 1

⁶¹ Nicolas Sarkozy, « Discours du Grand Paris », Palais de l'architecture, 29th of April 2009, 1st min 42.

As all the different studies we have previously seen, Paris is a global city. The president mentioned Paris as the rival of «London, New York, Tokyo and Shanghai», but Paris can lose its global position. This is why Nicolas Sarkozy insisted on the fact that the objectives of the Grand Paris project do not have only to consist to a simple enlargement of Paris within the regional borders; the city has to play an important role on a national, continental and global scale by becoming a model and an economic growth instrument.

The president claimed on the fact that the economic development of Paris as to be part of the European economic development axe (Milan-London), as the risk would be to see Paris felled behind the European Economic development, and the two main French harbours Marseille and Le Havre to be going downhill and collapse. To avoid this, the strategy for Paris is to re-establish a new territorial dynamic, and take the strategic decision to delineate Le Havre as the Grand Paris Harbour because of a new organisation of Paris alongside the Seine.

In order to achieve this, the president announced that Paris and Le Have will be connected with a highspeed line to link the two cities in one hour and the creation of a port of transformation in Paris (Achères). According to the president it would give the possibility to manage the transportations flow, in term of economic and sustainable development.

The sustainable development cannot be effective without any common policies of the different actors (Paris, suburban towns, Normandy region, etc), the different entities will have to work together on the Grand Paris. This condition is primordial in order to adapt the commercial connections to the sustainable needs, and finally create the new city environment which fits to the new century. Indeed, sustainable development is a major factor for Paris in term of business, respect of the environment, and also in term of image.

In order to answer to the social distortion existing in the region, President Sarkozy analysed that there is a real conflict between the offer and the demand on the housing market. Indeed, the problem of distance between work and place of living of the employees has to be reduced. The president first asked to create 70.000 habitations per year (which multiplies by 2 the rhythm of construction), as the region has a deficit of 1.5 million of habitations to answer the future demands (horizon 2030)⁶³. In order to achieve this goal, the president asked to deregulate the legislation, by increasing the coefficient of habitation, and ease the constructions. President Sarkozy wants also to abolish the zone policies (zone of activities, industrial zones, residential zones, etc) in order to create a diversity within the cities.

⁶³ Nicolas Sarkozy, « Discours du Grand Paris », Palais de l'architecture, 29th of April 2009, 25th min 15

Indeed, «a juridical decompartmentalize, will open the physical decompartmentalize»⁶⁴. As mentioned in this sentence, the legal system has a decisive role in the building of the greater Paris. Nevertheless, as we have seen previously, Nicolas Sarkozy assumed that transit investment will have the main role in the elaboration of the project; as it will necessary have an impact on the Parisians companies.

Indeed, Nicolas Sarkozy asked for the construction in the suburbs, of a new high-speed station. The president suggested to do it in Paris-La Defense (business district), or to Le Bourget (business airport) to create a new polycentric city⁶⁵.

The president established four points that the transport policies will have to respect. The first one, is the high speed on the regional level, the second point is the easiness for people to move from a place to another place, the third point is to have good transports going to towns, the last point is to prefer overhead transports rather than underground every times it is possible⁶⁶.

Nicolas Sarkozy wants to have a Greater Paris close to the Parisians needs. Indeed he assumed that according to researches 2/3 of the intensification of the public transports use, will affect the existing infrastructures. The president asked to prioritize the optimization of the existing infrastructures to have public transports in suburbs as efficient as the central public transports (Metropolitan Vs. RER). An idea of the president is to have public transports working all night long. Nicolas Sarkozy would be favorable to see more changes in the journeys of the Parisians but more effortless, reducing the total time of journeys spent a day as the Swiss government applied for its entire country⁶⁷. Nicolas Sarkozy asked for the merger of RATP and SNCF in order to regulate the movements within Paris, to have an efficient transit system, by completing the transport lines missing and improve the general management.

President Sarkozy also imagined the structures of the future transports «automatic, fast, important capacities to link the different economic centre of the future»⁶⁸. Indeed the president Nicolas Sarkozy and Christian Blanc (state secretary for the development of the capital region), had a scalable plan for the future transportation line of Paris Ile-de-France⁶⁹. The directive schema for the development of the transports will be changed according to the new needs or ideas identify. Nevertheless the project realized already represents the construction of 130 kilometers of railways within Paris Ile-de-France,

⁶⁴ Nicolas Sarkozy, « Discours du Grand Paris », Palais de l'architecture, 29th of April 2009, 28th min.

with the ambition to create new connections and easiness to move for about 8 million of daily users of the public transports.

The budget announced by the president only for the automatic transport, will reach about about €35 billion⁷⁰. Sarkozy assumed that this investment will be an answer to the crisis, which will strengthen the entire country. Nicolas Sarkozy thinks to finance this project thanks to financial land-tax valorization which will provide important benefits (all the constructions of transports and stations will have a drastic impact on the house values by increasing them). The second income source will be the increase of the use of the public transports which will also generate higher profits and the breakeven point will be reached quickly (as it will be opened 24 hours a day all week long, with an automatic system to drive it).

Many projects of le grand Paris are profitable they will permit to have an investment public/private partnership (Gilles Carrez is in charge of this topic for the project).

The president concluded its elocution by insisting on the overall fact that the project of the Greater Paris will be generated by a «Green growth». The Greater Paris has to attract more Foreign Direct Investment to France. Nicolas Sarkozy assumed that the project will be done within ten years and the constructions of the infrastructures will start by 2012.

The demand of the president Sarkozy is clear: create a new system for Paris to promote a green environment in order to generate a growth of the attractiveness of the Parisian area. This growth will be articulated around major points such as investment in research, €800 million of public investment⁷¹ for the campus project concerning Le plateau de Saclay, which will gather different prestigious universities and schools such as Ecole Centrale Paris, Polythech Paris or university Paris XI.

Also public transports will permit a better circulation of people in the city/region, by creating new connections between Airports, business areas and housing areas, which will provide better revenues to government through taxes.

The companies will also mainly benefit from the new connection of Paris to Le Havre Harbour, which will fasten the imports and the exports, the intensification of the connection will certainly provide a reduce of the transportations costs. This total reduction of the delivery costs will impact the final good price, which will also provide more competitiveness to the Parisian companies, and will through this gain of competitiveness will lead to an increase of the corporate taxes perceived by the government and will permit to reimburse the public debt contracted to realize this project.

The president has raised many problems which will have to be solved in order to realize this massive project (such as private/public investment partnership). Nicolas Sarkozy asked to have some answers due to a legal regulations (creation of laws to manage and delimitate the entire project), to support the different constructions which will be realized for the project.

B-c The legal status of «Grand Paris»

To support the different projects which will be set up to create the Greater Paris, the parliament has voted different laws. Indeed the objectives of the project have been delimited through the law of Grand Paris, divided into five titles, composed by 29 articles.

The 1^st article describes the objectives and the functions of the project: creation of the new public transports network, to unify the different part of the Paris Ile-de-France territory, and develop the economy. The project is characterized as social and economic, and as the final goal to reduce the social disequilibrium between the different places, and control the expansion of the city⁷².

The first title is about the elaboration of tools and the implementation of the network of Grand Paris public transport. According to the Article 2 of the law, the new public transport infrastructure will be an automatic tube which will link the competitiveness centers⁷³.

The second title of the law is done to create «La Societé du Grand Paris». In order to achieve these missions, the article 7 of the law permits the creation of a public institution («Société du Grand Paris»). It will have the mission to create and elaborate the transit infrastructures of the Greater Paris project. The article 8 of the law describes the functioning of this new public institution. Indeed it declares that the board of directors of La Société du Grand Paris, will be controlled by a supervision council. According to the article 8 this public institution directory, will be composed by three members (Marc Veron has been elected as the president of the directory), and the supervision council is composed by MPs, representatives of the region council, and representatives of each departments of the region (the president elected of the supervision council is André Santini) ^74.

The third title is about how the public transports of the Greater Paris will be realized, and how it will
be run. Indeed, the Article 12 of the law shows that Société du Grand Paris will manage the
investments to build the automatic tube. According to the article 13, Société du Grand Paris is the

⁷² Assemblée Nationale, « Projet de Loi relatif au Grand Paris », Décembre 2009, P.P 3.

only institution which is allowed to designate the private or public institution which will realize the project.

The fourth title is about the territorial development of the region, by showing all the guarantees. Indeed the contracts done between Société du Grand Paris and the towns are quantitative and qualitative: they have to show how the project will affect the municipalities concerned by the public transports projects⁷⁵.

The fifth and last title of the law concerns the creation of a scientific centre named Paris-Saclay, in the south suburbs of Paris (Essone department). Indeed the article 20 permits the creation of a public institution «Etablissement public de Paris-Saclay», which has the objective to develop a world leading scientific centre⁷⁶.

Paris-Saclay according to the article 21 has to invest in infrastructures, to attract the implementations of companies, and high educated people. The public institution will have to find investors to develop this centre which will have to be considered as one of the best in the world. This centre will permit to generate an economy of innovation in Paris Ile-de-France⁷⁷.

C- How this project could create an economic growth.

C -a Keynes Theory

The French government decided to finance different projects to create the Greater Paris, in order to generate an economic growth. This principle directly comes from the British economist John Maynard Keynes (1886-1946). Indeed, Keynes advocated that the government had to finance projects in order to support the national economy, and demonstrated it in its book «The general theory of employment, interest and money» which is considered as certainly the reference economic book of the XXth century.

Indeed in this work, Keynes wanted to discover what would be the factors to determinate the employment rate, and opposed his beliefs to the classical economics as Ricardo who believed in the Say's law. This classical economic theory assumes that the offer is enough to regulate the demand. Keynes did not believe in the market regulation of the demand by the offer. Indeed he stated that the

⁷⁵ Assemblée Nationale, « Projet de Loi relatif au Grand Paris », Décembre 2009, P.P 20

⁷⁷ Assemblée Nationale, « Projet de Loi relatif au Grand Paris », Décembre 2009, P .P.25

employment market rate was depending on the production volume forecasted by the companies, and shown the employment rate would only be the result of the production needed by the companies (the «effective demand»)⁷⁸. Keynes also explained that the consumption of the population depends on the «fundamental psychological law» which aimed to explain that people would increase their consumptions if their revenues increase also. In its theory Keynes demonstrated the «marginal propensity to consume»⁷⁹ (higher revenue for the lowest incomes will impact more the economy than higher the revenue level of high incomes).

By demonstrating his general theory, Keynes has shown the importance of the state in the economy because of the multiplier effect⁸⁰. Indeed as he did not believe in the market auto-regulation, he declared «The government should pay people to dig holes in the ground and then fill them up «

According to Pierre Rosanvallon, even if France has lately adopted the Keynesian theory, it is still the country where the theory has been the most applied. It has been for France a great compromise between Socialism and Capitalism, and permitted to the country to have a great growth over thirty years⁸¹.

Indeed, according to the author the Keynesian theory became more legitimate because of the perception about the economy. Indeed the increase of the purchasing power or economic growth became objectives for the governments (which was not possible with the classical perception as the economic growth is a result of the natural auto-regulation of the market)⁸².

This is why in 1945 and 1946 the role of the French government regarding the economy strongly increased, by becoming the first investor in the country. Indeed because of World War II the government had to rebuild the nation with a politic of economic recovery.

Over the decades France relied on this economic theory (even if some budget restriction were applied
by Raymond Barre government), and even permitted to François Mitterand to be elected in 1981 with
«Le plan Mauroy» (which was a Keynesian plan). Nevertheless after two years of this plan, the results

⁷⁸ Keynes J.M., The General Theory of Employment, Interest, and Money, 1936, Chap.3

⁸¹ Rosanvallon Pierre. Histoire des idées keynésiennes en France. In: Revue française d'économie. Volume 2 N°4, 1987. pp. 22-56.

⁸²Rosanvallon Pierre. Histoire des idées keynésiennes en France. In: Revue française d'économie. Volume 2 N°4, 1987, P.P. 44

were not expected: indeed this plan mainly helped the German exports because of the free-trade within the EU borders.

C -b Classical theory

An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations (more commonly called `The wealth of Nations), published in 1776 has played in the construction of our modern economic system. Indeed, Adam Smith is considered as the father of the modern economy, as his ideas have been followed by the most powerful countries in the world.

Andrew Wyatt Walter associates Adam Smith to the notion of a natural «harmony of interests»⁸³. Indeed, in the wealth of Nations, Adam Smith explained the principle of the invisible hand by showing that every individual is acting in the way to maximize his personal benefits:

«As every individual, therefore, endeavours as much as he can, both to employ his capital in the support of domestic industry, and so to direct that industry that its produce maybe of the greatest value; every individual necessarily labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can. He generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it. By preferring the support of domestic to that of foreign industry, he intends only his own security; and by directing that industry in such a manner as its produce may be of the greatest value, he intends only his own gain; and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention»⁸⁴.

As explained by Andrew Wyatt Walter, Smith recognized a «natural order» drives by a self-interested behavior⁸⁵. The benefits from this behavior will be more important if it is applied in a system of «natural liberty». Indeed, due to the important regulations applied by the governments, the liberalism theory assumes that it is important to banish them in order to have an economic liberalization, which would create an economic growth. According to Smith, this economic liberalization would be characterized by the promotion of free choice of occupation (according to the personal interests), free trade in land, free internal trade and free trade in foreign commerce⁸⁶.

⁸³ Andrew Wyatt Walter, Ian Clark, Iver B. Neuman, Classical theories of international relations, St Antony's series, 1996, P.P.143-172

⁸⁴ Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, 1776, Book IV, Chap.II, P.P. 363-364.

⁸⁵ Andrew Wyatt Walter, Ian Clark, Iver B. Neuman, Classical theories of international relations, St Antony's series, 1996, P.P.145

Indeed, these principles according to Smith would help to expand the market, which is really desirable as it would bring a greater advantage of the division of labor and of man's natural propensity to exchange⁸⁷. In the Wealth of Nations, Smith reduced the state to sovereign functions:

«According to the system of natural liberty, the sovereign has only three duties to attend to; three duties of great importance, indeed, but plain and intelligible to common understandings: first, the duty of protecting the society from the violence and invasion of other independent societies; secondly, the duty of protecting, as far as possible, every member of the society from the injustice or oppression of every other member of it, or the duty of establishing an exact administration of justice; and, thirdly, the duty of erecting and maintaining certain public works, and certain public institutions, which it can never be for the interest of any individual, or small number of individuals to erect and maintain; because the profit could never repay the expense to any individual, or small number of individuals, though it may frequently do much more than repay it to a great society»⁸⁸

According to many authors, Liberalism and free trade do not only generate an economic growth. Indeed according to Immanuel Kant, the liberalism system would lead to the peaceful relations between the countries. Indeed he believed that self-interests behavior (Smith theory) would permit the end of tensions between the different nations⁸⁹.

Liberal internationalism of Kant, takes into consideration that wars can be overcome, thanks to domestic changes and the establishment of international structures of governance. Kant has established three points directly connected to the Liberal theory, which should permit the end of wars. Indeed, the «Kantian constraints» are⁹⁰:

- Democracy: Kant suggested that democracies can lead to a worldwide stability. Indeed democracies rarely fight each other.

- International trade: This point has a solid place in the liberal thought. As international trades reinforce the GDP of the countries involved, it creates an interdependency which means that the nations maintain good relations between each other.

⁸⁸ Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, 1776, Book IV, Chap.II, P.P. 560-561.

⁸⁹ Bruce Russett, Tim Dunne, Milja Kurki, Steve Smith, International relations theories discipline and diversity, Oxford, 2010, P.P. 96

- International organizations: IGOs have each to focus on specific topics, in specific regions of

the world. They ensure the good functioning of the liberal system (for example World Ttrade

Organization), or good political relations between the countries (United Nations).

These liberal points developed by Kant have good interactions, to provide peace and economic prosperity to the countries. The following graph shows how work these interactions (The Kantian triangle).

Bruce Russett used the European Union as a case study to explain better the classical liberalism system. Indeed according to the author, the founding fathers of the EU (Konrad Adenauer, Alcide de Gaspari, Jean Monnet, and Robert Schuman) had set up an economic system based on the classical liberalism⁹².

⁹¹ Reproduction from : Bruce Russett, Tim Dunne, Milja Kurki, Steve Smith, International relations theories discipline and diversity, Oxford, 2010, P.P. 107

⁹² Bruce Russett, Tim Dunne, Milja Kurki, Steve Smith, International relations theories discipline and diversity, Oxford, 2010, P.P. 109

Indeed as Bruce Russett analyzed, the EU is one of the most liberalized institution in the world. First, it is important to highlight the free trade within the EU area. This point perfectly answers to the theory of Adam Smith about the free trade. The EU even adopted a common currency to facilitate the exchange. As we have previously seen, there is also a specialization of the territories (clusters in Paris and in every regions of Europe) in order to maximize the profits and efficiency, and be in an international trade. As Kant has shown, these exchanges created an economic interdependence, which set good relations between the European member states

This European Union is also composed by supranational institutions in order to control the exchanges and take common decisions in order to keep a homogenous strategy (European court of Justice, European council, or the European parliament).

The European Union is the perfect example to characterize the liberal system. Indeed it is composed by all the Liberalism insights such as free trade, and proves perfectly the efficiency of the Kantian triangle.

Bruce Russett has shown that the European Union was driven by the classical liberalism insights. Paris being the most important city of Europe, we can formulate our first hypothesis regarding the economic development.

As we have seen, the European Union is functioning under the liberal theory. Nevertheless, the French government has, as we have previously seen, been an important interventionist state. According to Vivien Schmidt, the French government realized during the 80's that their traditional economic system of interventionism based on the Keynesian model was not efficient anymore, because of the global economy change⁹³. Indeed the Keynesian tools lost their efficiency with the free trade development in Europe, as the economic recovery of 1981 has shown the limits of the fiscal policy. Indeed at this time the economic recovery helped more the German economy than the French one.

But is this project of Grand Paris from a Keynesian model? We could argue that yes, the government is using the multiplier effect in order to generate some economic growth. By the willing of the state to invest in new transports infrastructures, we can directly see the correlation with the Keynesian policy.

⁹³ V. Schmidt, «From stake to market, the transformation of French Business and government», University of Cambridge, 1996, P.P. 175

Indeed, according to the Prime Minister report, the economic objectives of the project are in these words «to obtain a Keynesian effect on the economy»⁹⁴. The government will inject some money in the economy through important construction projects, in order to obtain the multiplier effects of the General theory of Keynes.

This is why we can seriously think about the economic impact of the Greater Paris on the economy, because of the discordance of the French and European economic models.

We can see where would be a major problem for the Greater Paris in its goal to create an economic growth. Article 14 of the loi relative au Grand Paris precise that «la societé du Grand Paris» has to select the actors which will be in charge of the construction of the new automatic transport infrastructure according to competitive criterion⁹⁵.

Because of this law we can see a threat for the Parisians and French companies. Indeed, the construction of this automatic line will cost approximately 20 billion of Euros. The region and the government will have to issue a call for tender, and will maybe have to entrust the project to a foreign company.

As previously seen, the François Mitterand's policy of 1981 had used a Keynesian model to recover the French economy at this time. But because of the free trade area of Europe, the French consumption has generated more imports from Germany, as the German products were more competitive regarding to their price.

This is why we can link this historical problem to the Greater Paris model. As the «Societé du Grand Paris», the project should create approximately one million jobs. Nevertheless, this forecast should be strongly reduced if for example a company from Eastern Europe would win the tender.

Indeed, this eventual foreign company could «import» its labor force to France, without hiring French labor force. This would impact the economic recovery expected by this investment, because of the low hiring rate for the transport system construction.

So no, the Greater Paris cannot be considered as part of the European economic model as it is an application of the Keynesian model. This is why, because of the European economic infrastructure; we can analyze some threats which could reduce the expectations from this project regarding the economic recovery objective.

⁹⁴ Premier Ministre François Fillon, « Projet de loi relatif au Grand Paris étude d'impact, 2009, P.P.31

⁹⁵ Assemblée Nationale, « Projet de Loi relatif au Grand Paris », Décembre 2009, P.P 16

Nevertheless, this analyze has to be moderated, because the injection of the money will still be effective. Indeed, this project will still increase the consumption in France (even if the construction of the new public transport system, will just be ensured by foreign labor force, the moving of this population to France would still increase the French market consumption). We also have to notice the human benefits of this project (people closer to their work place, so maybe more efficient at work), which can also be taken into consideration, with no matter concerning the economic model used.

D-The projects proposed for the Greater Paris

D -a Public transports projects

Grand Paris project is at the moment mainly focus on the improvement of the transportation system, which is an important point according to the economic growth it can generate. Indeed as we have seen, the government is going to create an automatic tube going around Paris, to link all the different economic centers of the region. Two projects were in confrontation: the regional project named «Arc Express» (created and supported by Jean-Paul Huchon) and the governmental one (created and supported by Christian Blanc named «Grand Huit»). Nevertheless, a compromise has been found between these two parties, such as the two projects will complement each other.

This compromise has been mainly found due to the general will to accomplish the mission given by the president. The region and the government created a new plan, in order to have both of the projects unified in one single plan.

Christian Blanc and Jean-Paul Huchon created an automatic transport system, which has the objective to reduce the journey time of the Parisians by 20 to 30 minutes on average.

Indeed, the ten agencies consulted for the Great Paris have also proposed projects to improve the actual situation. Roger Strik Harbour + Partners London School of Economics Arup proposition also pointed out the necessity to create a network around Paris, by connecting all the economic centers⁹⁷.

The agency proposed the creation of three «belts» around Paris, the first belt would be composed by a tramway following the ring of the city of Paris, to permit a better displacement around the city centre, to go from a gate to another quickly. The second ring of transports will be positioned in the close suburbs («petite couronne») composed by a suburban RER as this area is really densified, it would also link to Le Bourget Airport and Paris Charles de Gaulle airport. This public transport line would permit a direct connection between airports and business areas, which is one of the main point raised by the government. The third ring would connect the suburbs place positioned further from the city center, but which still have a really important place in the good functioning developing of Paris. Indeed this line would link Orly Airport, Le plateau de Saclay. This would work because of a system of tram/train connection. Where the proposition distinguishes itself, it is by proposing a TGV link between La Défense-Boulogne Billancourt-Massy to connect all the west suburban area, and also to link it to the airports thanks to a high speed transportation infrastructure.

According to the agency, these changing would create a complete network around Paris. By
connecting these nodal points of the Parisian economy, it would ensure their economic growth, but

⁹⁷ Roger Stirk Harbour, Le Grand Pari(s), Consultation internationale sur l'avenir de la métropole Parisienne, PP.46

would also attract more people to live there. Even if this plan keeps the region under a polycentric approach, it would give a better repartition of population and economic growth, and would reduce the impact on the environment.⁹⁸ The following map shows the project proposed by the agency

⁹⁹Figure 9: Roger Stirk Harbour proposition of transport lines for the Greater Paris

Another proposition done by the agency Atelier Christian De Portzamparc to improve the public transports system of Paris Ile-de-France is the creation of 22 stations around Paris (transport line of 35 kms)¹⁰⁰.

Atelier Castro/Denissof/Casi as the others recommended the creation of a public transport line going around Paris, to link the cities, with tubes, tramways and trains (named «Le parcours poétique»). The interesting innovation proposed by the agency, is the creation of public fluvial transports on the Seine and Marne rivers¹⁰¹.

⁹⁸ Roger Stirk Harbour, Le Grand Pari(s), Consultation internationale sur l'avenir de la métropole Parisienne, PP.46

⁹⁹ Roger Stirk Harbour, Le Grand Pari(s), Consultation internationale sur l'avenir de la métropole Parisienne, PP.46

100 Atelier Christian De Portzamparc, Le Grand Pari(s), Consultation internationale sur l'avenir de la métropole Parisienne, P.P 119

101 Atelier Castro/Denissof/ Casi, Le Grand Pari(s), Consultation internationale sur l'avenir de la métropole Parisienne, P.P 223

The agency gave also the idea to create five new stations all located in the suburbs, in order to create equilibrium in the region. The agency advocates the creation of these stations in Versailles, La Défense, Stains, Bobigny Noisy-Le-Sec and Ile de Vitry. All these stations would be connected to each other and would have an economic role to develop their areas, and to improve the connections of the national TGVs¹⁰².

Indeed, by building these new centers of displacements, it would generate the creation of new important centers around Paris and facilitate the national transport connections (from west to east) through Paris by enlarging the center and reduce the traveler concentration. The Gare Sud (station proposed to be built by the agency at Vitry), would ensure the economic growth of Val de Seine (area around this place), by giving a more convenient access, which lead to an attractiveness for the companies. The following map shows the plan created by the agency in order to succeed their project.

¹⁰³Figure 10: Atelier Castro/Denissof/ Casi proposition of transport lines for the Greater Paris

D -b Expected impact on the economy

According to Jean-Paul Lacaze, as the displacements of people going from a suburban town to another
town located in the suburbs keep increasing, the transportation project proposed by the government
and the region will not be big enough to please the demand of all the inhabitants of Paris Ile-de-

France. Indeed, the «Grand Huit» would be too slow to be efficient, if it would have to stop to all the stations in the «circle».

Jean-Paul Lacaze even considers an extra investment would be needed in addition to the 35 billion requested for the new public transport project, in order to support the existing framework of transports, as many lines are saturated¹⁰⁴. We could analyze this as an important threat to the business health of Paris (if the addition of new infrastructures can generate an economic growth, the existing transportation inefficiency can destroy some of the wealth). According to Marcel Belliot, the renovation of the existing infrastructures would cost €18 million, and ask if there is a real necessity to create such a big transportation system («Grand Huit»). Its financing will certainly be prioritized compare to the other projects (CDG express linking Paris CDG airport to the city centre), and could delay their realizations (or could even be abandoned). The author also criticizes the fact that the financing of this transport creation is still not clear¹⁰⁵.

Indeed this project brings a lot of hopes from the users, because of their conditions of living. Philippe Panerai concluded its work «Paris Métrople. Formes et échelles du Grand Paris», by assuming: the future vision of a Greater Paris more fair and unified, would depend of the plan of the public transports»¹⁰⁶.

Nevertheless, this project could still have a significant impact on the Parisian companies' results. Indeed, as we have seen, this project would be based on the objective to link (so to accelerate) the connections between the places located «far away» from each other to provide a closeness of these areas. According to Ascher, the long distance between stations creates a quantum tunneling, which creates proximity between the different economic centers linked, which is an important impact on the good expansion of the companies¹⁰⁷.

As previously seen, the project will lead to an important reduction of the journey, in order to show the impact on the Parisian companies, the two following maps show the gain to go to two important economic centers Paris CDG Airport and La Défense :

104 Jean-Paul Lacaze « Le fait du prince ? », revue urbanisme, Octobre 2009, P.P 69

105 Marcel Belliot, « Le Grand Paris des illusions », revue urbanisme, Octobre 2009, P.P 64

106 Philippe Panerai, « Paris Métropole », Edition de La Villette, Aout 2008, P.P.103-107

When looking at this map, we can realize how important will be the journey reduction to go to the main international airport of Paris. Indeed, from the city centre the time saved to reach the Paris CDG will be reduced by 3 to 10 minutes, while the gain of time from La Défense business district will be between 10 and 20 minutes.

The project aims to close the airport to the business district by reducing the time, in order to facilitate international business displacements.

108 Débat publique Grand Paris, Evolution stratégique environnementale du réseau de métro automatique de Paris, 2010, P.P 44

In 1998, Berion concluded its research by the fact that public transports infrastructure cannot generate an economic growth as a single factor. Nevertheless it is still a major economic development system¹¹⁰.

Indeed according to Banister and Berechmann (2001), transit infrastructures investments would have only a positive impact if three factors are operational¹¹¹:

- Presence of positive economic externalities: labour market, quality of the labour market, dynamism of the economy.

109 Débat publique Grand Paris, Evolution stratégique environnementale du réseau de métro automatique de Paris, 2010, P.P 49

110 Pascal Berion, « Analyser les mobilités et les rayonnements des villes pour révéler les effets territoriaux des grandes infrastructures de transport », les cahiers Scientifiques du Transport, n°33, 1998, P.P. 125-126.

111 Banister, D., & Berechmann, Y. (2001). Transport investment and the promotion of economic growth. Journal of Transport Geography 9, 209-218.

- Investment factors: money available for the transportation investment and the effects of transport network.

Berion also assumes that the metropolisation of a territory (which corresponds to our present case) needs a densification of the infrastructures in the key area¹¹².

Many studies have shown the correlation between the GDP and the mobility within the region. Indeed it generates new needs of displacement to the population, the governments have to support this growth and answer to the transport users by creating new lines adapted to the needs. The mobility growth has a direct impact on the transportation demand, which will lead to the development of new services.

According to Oeil-CEBR in 1994, in urban environments, the labour force availability does not only depend of the population density, but also of the time the workforce needs to go to work. This assumption permits us we to link the economic benefits of the public transports densification of Paris on the labour market¹¹³.

Some researchers also demonstrated that a public investment in transportation would improve the quality of life of the inhabitants, by reducing the time required to reach a destination, and also by increasing their property holdings value due to the implementation of new stations¹¹⁴.

B-c Logistic projects to export

As we have previously seen, the president qualified Le Have harbor as the main access of Paris to the sea. Indeed, one agency Antoine Grumbach & Associes has titles its project «Seine Metropole Paris Rouen Le Havre»¹¹⁵.

The agency has thought about a development between Paris and Le Havre harbour in order to increase
the competitiveness regarding the exports and imports costs. In this project, the creation of a high
speed train to connect the two areas and also the creation of different river ports would be the solution

113 Sourced by Juan Pablo Bocajero, « Evaluation économique de l'impact des politiques publiques liées à la mobilité, le cas de Paris, Londres, Bogota et Santiago », Université Paris Est, 2008, P.P 36

114 Saurav Dev Bhatta, Matthew P. Drennan, «The Economic Benefits of Public investment in Transportation», P.P.289

115 Atelier Castro/Denissof/ Casi, Le Grand Pari(s), Consultation internationale sur l'avenir de la métropole Parisienne, P.P 125

to increase the exchanges between the companies located in Paris and Le Havre as the economic growth generates by this project will increase the number of companies present in this area.

As the president mentioned, the agency also placed Achères harbour at the centre of the fluvial policy. Indeed the connexion in Paris Ile-de-France to Le Havre Harbour would be located in Achères, because of the town location on the Seine and Oise rivers. Achères would become the Parisian logistic headquarter by stocking all the products coming from or going to Le Havre harbour by train or by ship, moreover its location would permit to be controlled by La Défense which could become the logistic decision centre on an European scale¹¹⁶.

The purpose of the development of High speed line will also be to connect it to the existing European High speed network in order to help the exports from Le Havre harbour to the rest of the continent. Because of the development of this line, station as La Défense could become important TGV station, the line Paris-London could be doubled by having TGVs passing by Amiens and Cergy-Pontoise¹¹⁷. According to the estimation of the agency, Le Havre-Paris journey would represent 1 hour thanks to the TGV.

The road projects aim to propose public transports on the high ways, in order to ensure the network development in this area. Because of the fluvial projects, the roads will not be the main way use by the companies to ensure their deliveries, as it is considered as less eco-friendly and more expansive¹¹⁸. Indeed A13 highway between Paris and Le Havre could be transformed by creating new delivery relays: individuals could go to these new centres and pick up products they ordered¹¹⁹.

The challenge for Paris in this case would be to become the main gate of Europe to the Atlantic Ocean, in order to compete with the Northern cities of Europe (Rotterdam).

The following map shows the project of connexion between Paris and Le Havre harbour.

116 Michèle Leloup, Marion Bertone, « Le Grand Paris, les coulisses de la consultation », 2009, P.P38 ¹¹⁷Ibid, 2009, P.P38

118 Atelier Castro/Denissof/ Casi, Le Grand Pari(s), Consultation internationale sur l'avenir de la métropole Parisienne, P.P. 139

119 Michèle Leloup, Marion Bertone, « Le Grand Paris, les coulisses de la consultation », Archibooks, 2009, P.P38

According to the agency analysis, this project would lead to different impacts. First, it would emancipate Paris from the Rhine river, by developing the interdependence with La Seine river, which would permit the use of a French harbour.

The second point made by proposing this project would be an expansion of Paris toward Le Havre through Rouen. Indeed it would ensure existing industries, and would permit the development of new industries in this area. The connexions of these industries with Paris will be done by La Seine, and these industries will be able also to export easily their productions to foreign countries through Le Have Harbour¹²¹.

Hypothesis 2: Transport investments will be the main improvements on the economy

By analyzing the theoretical investment of the Greater Paris in transportation, we can understand how important will be its effects on the regional economy.

Savrav Dev Bhatta and Matthew P.Drennan have listed six possible economic benefits from a public investment in transportation:

120 Michèle Leloup, Marion Bertone, « Le Grand Paris, les coulisses de la consultation », 2009, P.P129

121 Atelier Castro/Denissof/ Casi, Le Grand Pari(s), Consultation internationale sur l'avenir de la métropole Parisienne, P.P. 130

Researches have been conducted in order to demonstrate these points. Indeed by using statistics and the linear regressions methods, it became possible to show the correlation between public investments and measure this impact (negative or positive impact and the scale of the impact).

Acording to the research, there is an increase of output measurable by gross state product (GSP), private GSP or manufacturing output. Conrad and Seitz (1994) have used different highways, rail, mass transit and airport to measure the public capital, and measure the economic benefit with the output in three sectors of Western German economy. The results found out were an increase of the output and productivity, and a reduction of the costs¹²³.

Nevertheless, the effects of a public investment will have only a local effect. Indeed, Boarnet confirmed the positive effects of a highway on the private sector output in a region. He also showed that this highway will have an indirect impact on the neighboring regions, and a negative significant effect on private sector output¹²⁴.

Alicia Munnel has found out a correlation in 1990, concerning the relation between public expenditures and productivity. Indeed, the author has shown that some investments have a strong relationship on the output of firms: transportation, water, gas and electricity are the most correlated factor to the productivity. Indeed her findings imply that a 1 percent increase in public (or private) capital will increase output by 0.35 percents. The author also mentioned that even public investments with a correlation statistically less significant on the productivity (as hospitals or schools), have still an important impact on the efficiency of the workers (more educated and healthy)¹²⁵.

The public investments also have an impact regarding the cost of production. Indeed, Bhatta listed
nine researches showing a correlation between public expenditure and cost reduction, with an

122 Saurav Dev Bhatta, Matthew P. Drennan, «The Economic Benefits of Public investment in Transportation», Journal of planning education and research, 2003, P.P.289

123 Conrad,K. and H. Seitz, «The economic benefits of public infrastructure», Applied Economics 26, P.P 3303- 311 sourced by . Saurav Dev Bhatta, Matthew P. Drennan, «, The Economic Benefits of Public investment in Transportation», P.P. 290-292.

124 Boarnet M.G., « The direct and indirect economic effects of transportation infrastructure», University of California Transportation Center , n°340, 1996 P.P. 12

125 Munnell, A.H., « Why has productivity growth declined ? », New England Economic Review, 1990, P.P. 17

elasticity of -0.05 to -0.21 which concretely means a decline of 0.05 percents to 0.21 percents of the costs production for an increase of 1% of the public investment¹²⁶.

Haughwout showed a correlation regarding house values and public investments in highway. Indeed, he found out a negative effect of the public investment expenditure regarding in Highway regarding the house values. Haughwout even specified that houses values located in the city centers will suffer more that houses located in the suburbs, as they do lost their location advantage¹²⁷.

As we have seen, many advantages have been shown off with all these different studies. It is also important to see the quantified profits to the society of these policies. Different authors have worked on research to quantify the rate of return on public capital. Nadiri and Mamuneas have estimated a rate of return range from 4.9 percents to 7.2 percents¹²⁸. According to the statistics, and regarding to our context, an investment of €30 billion Euros (budget to build new transports and improve the existing structures) this would represent an estimated return of €1.47 to €2.16. Also as previously mentioned, an investment of €22 billion of Euros just to create the new automatic public transports infrastructures in the Grand Paris project, would generate 690800 jobs, and companies affected by this project would gain €66 billion in sales, and the users would save €33 billion.

All these studies show how public/private investments in public transport could affect the Parisian (and Norman) economy. To conclude the hypothesis 2, we can say that yes, transport investment will be the main improve of the region regarding the project because of the results possible and expected.

D-c Environmental projects

Le Grand Paris project is often linked to a simple transport project, nevertheless this idea is false. Indeed, even if the government does not already taken official decisions for Paris Ile-de-France in order to reduce the ecological impact.

Indeed, the government wants to create a Paris Ile-de-France eco-friendly. According to Jean-Robert Mazaud, a sustainable city is an urban area able to recycle its wastes in order to aliment its agricultural productions, and also creates some energy. A sustainable city is also able to reabsorb its CO2 emissions, and use all its spatial territory with efficiency¹²⁹.

126 Saurav Dev Bhatta, Matthew P. Drennan, «The Economic Benefits of Public investment in Transportation», P.P.293

127 Haughwout, «Regional fiscal cooperation in metropolitan areas: an explanation», journal of policy Analysis and management 18, 1999, P.P. 579-600

128 Nadiri, Manumeas, «The effects of public infrastructure and R&D capital on the cost structure and performance of U.S. manufacturing industries»,The review of Economics and Statistics n°76, 1994, P.P22-37.

129 Michèle Leloup, Marion Bertone, « Le Grand Paris, les coulisses de la consultation », 2009, P.P 57

One «simple» project has been presented by MVRDV, which consists to create a new forest of 1 million trees dispatched on 2500 hectares in Roissy. This would impact the noise generated by the airport and will reduce the CO2 impact of the planes¹³⁰. The agency also proposed to cover the ring of Paris, to create an urban park, which would reduce the disparity between Paris and the suburbs.

The agency also thought to develop solar panels on the buildings' roofs of Paris, or use the Seine natural flow to produce electricity. Another idea from MVRDV to produce sustainable energy for Paris would also be to place some windmills around the territory borders¹³¹. If these ideas are applied, the region could stand-alone in order to produce all the energy needed for the good functioning of the territory.

LIN agency promoted the urban agriculture as part of its program for Le Grand Paris. According to Joseph Hanimann, the goal of this proposition is not to create an economic growth, but more to have a primordial symbol, and establish a spirit in the city¹³².

By investing in different projects, the government should create a city more eco-friendly with a new economic opportunities. Indeed behind this project to ensure a Green city, we can imagine the new regional positioning as explained by porter¹³³ that the government wants to provide to the region.

Indeed, Green investments bring economic growth with an innovative way. Development of new business (creation of new jobs), reduction of CO2 and improvement of the quality of life should be the results expected by these new policies.

Hypothesis 3: The Greater Paris project is not a generator for the green economy

As we have previously seen, the French government wants to create a Green impact through Grand Paris project. Indeed, the creation of a sustainable economy should be the final result expected by the Greater Paris. But we are now trying to demonstrate that the actual decisions taken by the La Société du Grand Paris are not sufficient, and not in the good direction to reach this objective.

Mathew Forstater has summarized the conditions needed to establish a sustainable economy. Indeed,
five points have been made in order to be able to respond to the ecological challenges, and to

130 MVRDV, Le Grand Pari(s), Consultation internationale sur l'avenir de la métropole Parisienne, P.P 125

131 Michèle Leloup, Marion Bertone, « Le Grand Paris, les coulisses de la consultation », 2009, P.P 177-178

132 Michèle Leloup, Marion Bertone, « Le Grand Paris, les coulisses de la consultation », 2009, P.P 160

133 Porter M. E. et Stern S. « Innovation: Location Matters», MIT Sloan Management Review n° 4, 2001, P.P. 28 to 37

understand better the relation between the economy and the environment. In this research Mathew Forstater uses the term «biophysical conditions» which are necessary for a sustainable economy¹³⁴.

134 Mathew Forstater, «Public employment and environmental sustainability», Journal of Post Keynesian Economics, Vol. 25, N°3, 2003, P.P. 387

135 Mathew Forstater, «Public employment and environmental sustainability», Journal of Post Keynesian Economics, Vol. 25, N°3, 2003, P.P. 388

5- The last point to achieve a sustainable activity must be that the level and composition of the production should not have thermal effects, and should preserve the biodiversity.

We can see a contradiction here, between the Greater Paris structure and its objectives. We assume that the Greater Paris is a Keynesian application model and one of its objectives is to create a green cluster to have a sustainable city and improve the economic situation. Nevertheless still according to Mathew Forstater, «traditional approaches to both unemployment and environmental degradation are insufficient to achieve either full employment or ecological sustainability»¹³⁷.

Indeed, even if Keynesian demand management could achieve full employment, the company competition is still based on price efficiency. Regarding this competition, we can assume that the Keynesian (or liberal) model can be environmentally destructive, as there are too many barriers for companies to reach the demand generated with a Keynesian stimulus¹³⁸.

After the reading of this article, we can realize the limits of our economic systems regarding the world sustainability. Indeed, how a government can generate a green environment, when there are too many barriers to adopt a green economic system?

Laura Albareda et al. have worked on the role of European governments on the Corporate Social responsibility, with a focus on environmental issues. Indeed the research aimed to focus on the interrelation, collaboration and partnership between governments, businesses and civil society stake holders¹³⁹.

The authors have illustrated the relationships between these three economic actors, due to a map. This map shows that governments interfere in CSR policies by showing the good examples. These governments' examples have to show the positive impact of these policies on businesses to encourage companies to adopt them. It aims also to give awareness to the civil society (stake holders) about the benefits of these politics. The overall benefits of the CSR policies on these three actors will improve the collaboration between governments, businesses and civil society¹⁴⁰.

138 Mathew Forstater, «Public employment and environmental sustainability», Journal of Post Keynesian Economics, Vol. 25, N°3, 2003, P.P. 391

139 Laura Albareda, Josep M. Lozano, Tamyko Ysa, «The Role of governments in Europe», Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 74, No. 4, (Sep., 2007), pp. 395.

The authors have analyzed different European governmental action to have an influence on CSR. Indeed, the authors have analyzed four different models to explain actions which are driven by governments in order to improve the CSR situation¹⁴²:

-Partnership model: Governments shares investment with actors to face the socio-employment problems. This strategy has been observed in Denmark, Finland, the Netherlands and Sweden.

-Business in the community: The government applies soft intervention policies to encourage the businesses to develop a green environment. This system has been observed in Ireland and the United .Kingdom.

- Sustainability and citizenship: This system implies the upgrade by the governments of the version of existing social agreement by focusing on sustainable development. Authors have located this approach in France Germany, Austrian Belgium and Luxembourg.

141 Laura Albareda, Josep M. Lozano, Tamyko Ysa, «Public Policies on Corporate Social Responsibility : The Role of governments in Europe», Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 74, No. 4, (Sep., 2007), pp. 395.

-Agora: Creation of groups to discuss on the different social actors to create a public consensus on CSR. This is mainly applies in Italy, Spain and Portugal.

Even with the critics of Mathew Forstater regarding the impossible application of a Green environment because of the Keynesian system, we can still analyze what would be the impact of the Government through the Greater Paris to install and improve the Green Business.

Indeed as mentioned in the article «The role of governments in Europe», the French government uses a sustainability and citizenship model. The authors attribute a special focus to France «Among the countries included under this model, France deserves special attention. In France, CSR is well-established in government-supported activities focusing on sustainable development So much so that, at times, such activities appear to be directed by the govern ment, revealing a more regulatory approach, in line with the apparently more centralist orientation of the French state.¹⁴³».

These points of view of the authors confirm the general approach of the French government to increase the green businesses: By investing in a project (Greater Paris), the government invest and forecast on a development of the Green Business by showing its interests and benefits (public debate of the Greater Paris).

Nevertheless, except the creation of a forest of one million trees, there are not others projects decided yet. Is this strategy to open a debate, and insisting on «Green communication» will be enough to develop a real Green Business in Paris Ile-de-France? The real question is to know if the Greater can create a R&D centre important enough to support a Green development, but also an IT development.

To conclude the hypothesis 3: Yes, we cannot see a real green cluster creation through the project of the Greater Paris. Indeed, as mention by the author Mathew Forstater, the economic model does not permit a real Green cluster enforcement of Paris Ile-de-France. In previous part we mentioned the fact that Paris is the most important city concerning green R&D. But these infrastructures were existing before the creation of the Greater Paris idea. Also as we said, Paris has the will to become the worldwide reference in term of sustainability, but unfortunately it has not been really considered so far as primordial in the Greater Paris construction. We could not see direct law to enhance a Green cluster, and the actual good positioning of Parisian research centers in this area do not result of the Grand Paris decisions, but rather from the general expansion of the «green» trend.

143 Laura Albareda, Josep M. Lozano, Tamyko Ysa, «Public Policies on Corporate Social Responsibility : The Role of governments in Europe», Journal of Business Ethics, Vol. 74, No. 4, (Sep., 2007), pp. 403

B-e -IT and R&D development in the Greater Paris

As we have seen an investment in Paris Saclay is part of the Greater Paris project. As mentioned in the Article 20 of «loi relative au Grand Paris», the government has created a state-owned company «Etablissement public» named Paris-Saclay¹⁴⁴

According to the article 21, Paris-Saclay will have to help to the development of higher education and also to create a R&D cluster¹⁴⁵. Indeed in this area are already present important universities, and companies:

The challenge for the region would be to attract more companies and universities in this area, in order to create a French Silicon Valley. By gathering the different R&D centers, with a high proximity to companies with high added value, Paris-Saclay should become one of the most advanced R&D areas in the world. This new area will strongly impact the economic growth of the region because of the common researches of companies and universities.

Regarding the R&D and IT context, the Greater Paris will also be impacted by the creation of its new automatic public transport line. Indeed, it is interesting to analyze what are the components needed, as such a project to see a development of IT components in the region.

144 Assemblée Nationale, « Projet de Loi relatif au Grand Paris », Décembre 2009, P.P 23.

Automatic transports use efficient new technologies of localization. Nowadays the systems used in automatic line (line 14 of the Paris' tube for example) have to be cheap and efficient enough to respond to the security norms¹⁴⁷.

These technologies are called «primary localization». In Paris, the line 14 is equipped by a primary localization system named «Météor». Every 720 milliseconds, the train communicate its localization, which permits to operation center to check its localization and its speed¹⁴⁸.

Others technologies are also used in an automatic line, in order to control the doors opening. Indeed regarding this issue, an optical system is used.. The principle is to equip the platform with a luminous receiving, and we place a laser on the train. When the train is positioned at the exact place, it sends a signal to the platform and opens the doors¹⁴⁹.

Many others technologies are used in an automatic tube line, such as inductive loops, radio beacons, infrared barriers, video analyze, or telemetry.

New technologies will mainly impact the environment of the Greater Paris. They are nowadays one of the major factors to build a functioning urban area, to connect the different parts of a city. As we have seen, an automatic public transport system uses complex technological systems in order to increase the public transport system efficiency in term of security and convenience for the users. This is why the simple creation of an automatic tube around Paris can be seen as a major improvement of the region regarding the new technologies.

ICT can be used in order to resolve different issues. Galit Cohen,, Ilan Salomon and Peter Nijkamp have characterized the ICT as following:

«- Very dynamic technological changes, with rapid penetration and adoption rates; - Decreasing costs for new equipment and features;

- A rapidly increasing range of applications and penetration in many realms of professional and personal life;

147 Project Scientifique collectif, « Automatisation d'une ligne de métro », RATP, May 2003, P.P. 9

148 Project Scientifique collectif, « Automatisation d'une ligne de métro », RATP, May 2003, P.P. 11

- An intertwined institutional market place, with the private sector acting in a decreasingly regulated environment; and

- A production and services package dependent on a range of qualities of skilled human resources.»¹⁵⁰

Indeed, according to the authors, the ICT are defined as electronic technologies and services used to improve the process. They are used by most of the businesses, in order to reduce human mistakes, and facilitating the actions¹⁵¹.

The authors have defined two different policies objectives form concerning ICT use, in an urban environment. The first one is to create infrastructure (which correspond to the Greater Paris case), indeed the ICT would help the governments to enhance the construction of different assets (public transports, buildings). The second form would be to credit the city of a strong international profile, which is still the case regarding to the Grand Paris project¹⁵².

In order to obtain these results expected from ICT, three types of policies have been identified.¹⁵³ Indeed, «Direct», «Indirect» and «by the way» policies.

- Direct policies: The objective is to promote the use of the ICT, and also to reach broader goals such as economic growth. An example of direct policy approach would be an investment to support the research on ICT or an improve of internet municipal (propose services on internet).

- Indirect policies: The indirect policies are the fact to obtain some behavioral changes from the population through ICT use. Indeed, these policies have the principle to communicate on social changes with ICT use (an example would be computer classes at school).

- By the way policies: They are the results of actions not directly correlated to the ICT, but which affect them. The example given is the defense industry which is one of the main contributors to the ICT development without being directly involved in.

As the authors mentioned, the distinction between direct and indirect policies are not clear, both of
them can be classified according to the context. Indeed, when the actions followed are directly ICT

150 Galit Cohen, Ilan Salomon and Peter Nijkamp, «Information-communications technologies (ICT) and transport: does knowledge underpin policy?, Telecommunication policy, 2002, P.P. 33

oriented (creation and development of new tools), then we consider the actions as «direct policies»; «Indirect policies» are considered when results expected need the use of ICT¹⁵⁴.

In our context, all of these policies can be considered. Indeed, by developing the scientific park of Paris-Saclay, we can assume that the investment done will support direct research on ICT (direct policy). This investment will also permit the purchase of ICT tools in order to conduct studies about other subjects (Indirect policy). We can also assume that this investment will lead to a By the way policy. Indeed, Paris Saclay focuses on a large number of topics, which can lead improve the ICT.

We can then understand the impact of R&D and IT on Grand Paris through two factors: public transports and Paris Saclay. We can directly consider the automatic public transport line as a «by the way» policy, while Paris Saclay could as mentioned earlier considered as Direct, Indirect and By the way policies to develop the ICT

First, we analyze the direct impact of new technologies use in the public transport context. Indeed by analyzing the first automatic line present in Paris we can already see the benefits of it : regular interval of 85 seconds for the automatic line, compare to 100-120 seconds for a manual one. Also the speed of an automatic line is increased by 15-20 km/h (from 20-25 Km/h to 40 km/h) compare to a manual line.¹⁵⁵

Nevertheless, as every lines composing the Paris underground network are different, it would be interesting to see what would be the impact of a transformation of one line. Moreover this point is even more crucial as the Automatic line of the Greater Paris will be connected to existing lines, which will have to be adapted to fit in the new automatic transportation system.

¹⁵⁶The study run about the line 3 of Paris highlights the benefits brought by the automation of a line thanks to its ICT. Indeed, a simulation is done in order to compare what would be the gain of an automatic line 3 rather than the existing manual one. The results are the following:

155 Project Scientifique collectif, « Automatisation d'une ligne de métro », RATP, May 2003, P.P. 4

156 Project Scientifique collectif, « Automatisation d'une ligne de métro », RATP, May 2003, P.P. 32

Indeed these results show clearly the impact of the use of new technologies on the underground network. When the number of train in circulation on the line is low (N=30 in the study), we can see that the ICT have not a real impact on the journey time needed by the trains to complete the entire line as the time needed is slightly the same. Nevertheless, higher is the number of trains, higher are the benefits received. Indeed, the study shows a difference of 62 unities of time when N=40 (M=1203 and A=1141), the results are even reaching a difference of 250 unities of time when N=50¹⁵⁸.

The transportation network of the Greater Paris project has the main objective to reduce the time of the travelers, by connecting new stations, and also by improving the existing infrastructures. This is why we can assume that new technologies in the public transports mainly impact the Grand Paris project, will permit to reach these expectations by responding perfectly to the needs of the region: a reduction of time of the every-day journeys.

The second aspect of the Grand Paris project concerning the development of the new technologies is the investment in the scientific park of Paris Saclay.

Donald S. Siegel, Paul Westhead and Mike Wright, have transcribed in their work the three fundamental features of Science Park (according to the United Kingdom Science Park Association): Their purpose is to support the growth of R&D, create a link between large firms and small high-tech companies and permit a direct link between universities and companies¹⁵⁹.

A study run by these three authors in the United Kingdom has shown the impact for companies to be present on Science parks (by comparison to companies not present on Science Park). According to this research, it is claimed that science park firms generate more patents and new products¹⁶⁰. This study also shows that companies located on a Science Park are more productive in research than companies

159 Donald S. Siegel, Paul Westerhead, Mike Wright, « Assessing the impact of university Science Parks on reaserch productivity : exploratory firm-level evidence from the United Kingdom », International Journal of Industrial Organization, March 2003, P.P. 3

off Science Park¹⁶¹. This statement confirms the necessity and the benefits for the Greater Paris to invest in Paris-Saclay, as the main objective is to reinforce its technological cluster.

Indeed, this investment of the French government aims to promote a higher productivity in R&D but also to promote the creation of new high-tech companies. Again, the development of Paris-Saclay will be really useful to obtain this expected result. According to Roure and Keely (1989), four factors are essential in the process of creation of New Technology-Based Firms¹⁶²:

-Government purchase contracts, research projects and incentives or subsidies to innovation.»

As we can see, these four factors can directly link these factors to Science Park advantages. Indeed, according to a study run by Peter Lindelöf, Hans Löfsten, High-tech companies are mainly taking into consideration the nearness to quality universities in order to decide the location of their headquarter¹⁶³.

The study also shows that Science Park permits to firms to create a strong network. Indeed the proximity to important customers, suppliers, researchers, other companies and high qualified workers, offered by Science Park would permit to support the growth of the companies¹⁶⁴.

This strength of networking proposed by the Science Park to the High-tech companies is also reflected by the value itself of the firms. Indeed a study run by Joanne Hill and Joel L. Naroff has proven that companies on Science Park have higher returns and lower risks for investors. The authors have also shown a correlation between the importances of location for these companies: they need to belong to a high-tech firm location in order to perform better¹⁶⁵.

162 Roure, J. B. and R. H. Keely, «Comparison of Predicting Factors of Successful High Growth Technological Ventures in Europe and U.S.A.», 1989 sourced by Peter Lindelöf, Hans Löfsten, «Science Park Location and New Technology-Based Firm in Sweden : Implications and Performance», Small Business Economics, Vol. 20, N°3, May 2003, P.P. 252

163 Peter Lindelöf, Hans Löfsten, «Science Park Location and New Technology-Based Firm in Sweden : Implications and Performance», Small Business Economics, Vol. 20, N°3, May 2003, P.P. 253

165 Joanne Hill and Joel L. Naroff, «The Effect of Location on the performance of High Technology Firms», Financial Management, Vol. 13, N°1, Spring 1984, P.P. 36

To conclude hypothesis 4, yes we can see that the Greater Paris project will impact the new technologies in the region. Indeed, by developing an automatic public transport network, the region will increase its ITC use. Also by investing in a new the Science Park Paris Saclay, the government will generate the development of new products, new patents. Also as we have seen, the Science Park leads to a better productivity for the companies and the research centers present on it. Science Park, also presents financial opportunities for companies, as they can be considered as more reliable by investors.

E-Analysis and discussions of the results

E -a Methodology

In order to test the four hypotheses a questionnaire has been sent to different persons in order to execute a qualitative research. Seven persons have accepted to answer to these questions; thanks to these professional answers it will be interesting to compare them to the previous academic findings.

The questionnaire is composed by eight questions which embrace the entire project of the Greater Paris. The seven profiles selected are really different from each others as the Grand Paris project is large, this multitude of profiles permitted to have answers from specialists about all the subjects : transports impact, business development, IT development or green economic growth.

Indeed as we just mentioned, their profiles are varied: Roxanne Dugenetay (City planner), Jean-Paul Chapon (Writer of «Paris est sa banlieue»), Thierry Galeron (Director of Champagne-Ardenne station), Florent Riveron (Environmental engineer), Georges Meitg (Director of Relay H transports - Paris Ile-de-France), Laurent Bach (Researcher of the University of Strasbourg) and Anthony Crenn (Project manager of Paris Métropole).

C-b Analysis

Our first hypothesis concerns the economic model of the Greater Paris («The greater Paris is not part of the European economic modal»). Indeed we analyzed that possible consequences because of the economic model of the Grand Paris project (Keynesian structure), that the region could not have economic benefits from this investment because of the liberalism structure of the European Union.

Indeed every European company will be able to apply for a tender, and then externalize the eventual economic growth.

According to Roxanne Dugenetay, city planner of the Grand Lyon agglomeration, there are not reasons to not see the region to benefit from investment. Indeed the investment should attract more population in Paris which will increase the house values on a middle/long term time, and this phenomenon will occur an en economic with no matter regarding the economic structure.

George Meitg, Director of the Relay H transport business unit, is also convinced by the future economic growth engenders by the Grand Paris, with no matter what the macroeconomic situation is. Indeed, from his professional opinion, this creation of fifty-eight stations represents a potential of fifty-eight new shops openings. This will clearly permit an economic growth to the company, and so also to the region, with no outflow of capital.

From an economist point of view, Laurent Bach high-lighted the main threat for the region concerning this issue: the suppliers. Indeed as we have previously seen in the academic researches, a foreign supplier could seriously reduce the expected growth. Nevertheless Laurent Bach also assumed that this investment will certainly be an impulsion for many companies to develop new competences, and so generate an economic growth.

According to five of the respondents, the Greater Paris will also impact the productivity of the firms. The reasoning of it would be an increase of the quality of life in the region, will certainly create a positive impact on the productivity, which will also generate a long term economic growth. Laurent Bach thinks that this higher-quality of life due to the transport improvement will not be strong enough to see a real improve of the workers. Anthony Crenn high-lights a threat: the automatic line will obviously not concern the entire Parisian agglomeration, it is then important to be careful about the companies not located on this new layout, as they could lose some competitiveness compare to the others companies.

Our first hypothesis is undermined by this qualitative research. Indeed, according to academic evidences, we had shown the inefficiency of such an investment on the economic growth because of an outflow of capital. The professional's answers have shown that they did believe in an economic growth, with any kind of economic infrastructure. Moreover even if the official constructor of the automatic line is still unknown, the French group RATP-Alstom is well positioned to win the tender.

The second hypothesis is «Transport investments will be the main improvements on the economy».
After the academic researches, we concluded that transports construction will be the main impact to

the Greater Paris not only because of the large amount of investment, but essentially due to the economic impact engenders by connecting faster the different economic clusters.

If all the respondents see the good impact of the transports on the economy, most of them do not see it as the essential investment. Indeed, as Thierry Galeron mentioned the transports do not create any economic growth alone. Any transit investment would not create an economic, as a single transport investment would be totally ineffective. Roxanne Dugenetay also rejected this statement of «transport investment as the main economic improvement». Indeed in the interview, Roxanne Dugenetay qualifies the transports as a «secondary function» or «support function» to the economy, and considers this investment similar at the French economic development of the sixties-seventies period.

However Roxanne Dugenetay and JP Chapon understand the reasons of this important investment in a first time. Indeed JP Chapon mentioned the existing transport infrastructures as disastrous. Nevertheless Roxanne Dugenetay mentioned the major impact from the public transports. Indeed, the public transports are correlated to the expected demographic growth expected to increase the economic growth; second impact would be the sustainability and the reduction of the car use; third impact the new location implantation choice of the companies thanks to the new train services.

Laurent Bach does not consider the transport project as the main economic improvement. Indeed, to create economic growth the project should have focused more precisely on scientific researches. Even if the Greater Paris is not only reduced to a simple tube line creation, the major investment will concern the transit and not the R&D which could have been the main economic improvement.

Florent Riveron has another critical view point on this issue. Even if he considers the public transport project as the main economic improvement of the region, he considers that the Grand Paris should have been more focus on renovation of existing infrastructures, in order to have solid basis before the creation of new infrastructures. Delay the construction of the automatic line could have permitted to reduce the price of it.

Georges Meitg seemed to be the most optimistic concerning this transport project. Indeed, even he did not consider it as a single solution to improve the economic situation, he high-lights the good development of Marne-La-Vallée due to the RER A and the companies attracted because of it.

Anthony Crenn confirmed this general idea to consider transports not as the main economic impact of the region as it cannot be considered as a single solution. It cannot be considered as the main improvement but rather as a solution to enable this regional economic growth.

Our second hypothesis is not confirmed by the respondents. Even if all the respondents see the major impacts of the transports, no one qualified it as the main economic improvement. Indeed they consider it as a «simple» boost to the economy.

The third hypothesis discussed «The Greater Paris project is a generator for the Green economy», was concluded in the theoretical part by «No, we cannot see a real green cluster creation through the project of the Greater Paris».

Florentin Riveron considers the Greater Paris has being totally part of a green economic growth. By referencing of the new ways of construction presented during the Grand Paris exhibition, Florentin Riveron sees real opportunities for companies to develop new competences, new materials to be adapted to the future legal constraints of construction in Paris Ile-de-France. He justifies this argument by its own professional observations. Indeed being Environmental engineer in the city of Orléans, he has experienced a strong growth concerning the new use of specific materials being more sustainable for the environment. By comparison of the two cities sizes, he assumed that the demand in Paris will logically generate as much offers and imagines it as «very strong in the near future».

Thierry Galeron sees a development of a green cluster because of the new transport utilization. Indeed, with the new transport project, people will drastically reduce the use of cars, which will benefits to the city environment. He thinks that these new habits could eventually push people to change their behaviors to transport themselves, being more eco-friendly minded. This general conscious will be certainly follow by the creation of new Green companies proposing new ideas, solutions, matching perfectly with this new frame of mind. Laurent Bach consolidates this statement by saying that this new transport infrastructure will engender the use of eco-friendly materials, and so the creation of specialized companies bringing solutions to maintain this transit system.

According to the respondents, the answer to the hypothesis 3 «The Greater Paris project is not a generator for the Green economy» would be no. Indeed according to this qualitative research, the respondents considered it as a generator for the green economy. Our hypothesis 3 is not verified by the respondents.

Our fourth and last hy pothesis «Greater Paris: incubator of IT and R&D», was confirmed by academic researches, by showing the impact of the Paris-Saclay, but also by the use of new technologies in the automatic line.

One of the main arguments to assume this statement would be the proximity between universities and firms. Roxanne Dugenetay considers it as one of the main arguments in the development of R&D through the Greater Paris project. This investment has to give a strong innovative image to the entire territory, in order to attract scientists and companies. According to her, Paris-Saclay has to become the showcase of the Scientific French know-how.

Florent Riveron qualifies this project as «excellent» for the competitiveness of the French IT and R&D. According to him, the location is ideal as famous universities are present in this area. Because of the future correlation between this science park and the future transport infrastructure, this area should become really competitive regarding the number of patents created.

Anthony Crenn considers this project as audacious, and hopes it will be able to compete with the Silicon Valley. Nevertheless, the difference of size, and the lack of attractiveness at the moment are the principal challenge.

This is argument is also shared by JP Chapon, who considers that this science park should not have the only argument to be located at only 30 minutes from Paris. It is essential to gather schools and companies to create a real competitive center, and to obtain this result, it will be essential to transform the actual place into a modern science center thanks to the Grand Paris investment.

Laurent Bach insists also on the future governance of Paris-Saclay which will be according to him a determinant point in the future success of this science park. Indeed considering new building as enough to enhance the production of R&D. Concerning the only development of IT due to the Greater Paris, as previously seen, Laurent Bach confirms the idea that the creation of a new automatic line could enhance the creation of companies to support the good functioning of the transports.

To conclude this last hypothesis test «Greater Paris: incubator of IT and R&D», we can conclude that this hypothesis is approved by the academic researches and the qualitative survey. Through the investment in Paris-Saclay and the creation of the automatic line, we can consider the Grand Paris as an incubator of IT and R&D.

E -c Discussion of the Results

As we have previously seen three out four of the hypotheses have not been verified by the respondents.

The first hypothesis «The greater Paris is not part of the European economic modal», by considering the Grater Paris as a whole, the respondent of the qualitative researches demonstrated that the Greater Paris investment will create an economic growth to the region, which in other words means that the region is well inserted in the European economic system, and will not suffer from its economic structure.

Indeed, even if theoretical works have shown the threats of Keynesian plan in a liberal environment (foreign supplier threat), it would be surprising to see a foreign supplier building the new tube line of Paris. Moreover, even with this aspect, the company would create some jobs in the region, and would also bring foreign workers who will increase the national consumption level.

The second hypothesis «Transport investments will be the main improvements on the economy», has also been unjustified by the qualitative research. Indeed by considering the transports as a support function, the respondents have high-light the inefficiency of a single transit investment, without neglecting its potential effects. Nevertheless as it has been shown a transportation investment will lead to attractiveness for the companies which will create an economic growth. But after all, could this issue be compared to the famous problematic «Who came first, chicken or egg?».

The third hypothesis «The Greater Paris project is a generator for the Green economy», has not been justified neither by the qualitative research. Indeed the respondents have seen correlation between the project and eventual green cluster development. Laurent Bach, project managers rightly assumed that the Greater Paris was not only a «transportation project». Nevertheless, even with the qualitative results, it can still be controversial to see the Green impact of the project at the moment. Indeed, a clear decision would have been the creation of a specific law to enhance this development, nevertheless there is nothing about it. Also La Cité Descartes has often been cited as the future Green Research center of Paris. But it is not easy to see the real impact of the Greater Paris on this competitive center, as the only implication of the Greater Paris in this scientific pole is the creation of a tube station to connect it to the rest of the Parisian agglomeration. Compare to one billion of Euros for Paris-Saclay, the interests of the region for the Green development seems still largely less important. The actual leading position of Paris Ile-de-France in the green development cannot be considered as the result of the Greater Paris. Nevertheless it is also important to precise the future evolution and creation of more projects by the Greater Paris.

The fourth hypothesis «Greater Paris: incubator of IT and R&D», has been justified by the qualitative research. Indeed thanks to the questions it has been possible to see a correlation between the Grand Paris projects and the development of IT with an higher productivity in R&D (IT introduced by the new automatic line, and the investment in Paris-Saclay).

It is also important to evocate some missing subjects in the project so far. Indeed, Georges Meitg talked about the missing of communication concerning the new station visage. It would be essential to have adapted new stations to this new public transport line. The problem of governance also has been mentioned as missing, we still do not know what will be the administrative map of the Greater Paris, and what will be the role of the different institutions. Some answers also concerning the way to finance this project would be also essential.

Conclusion

In this paper, we have been able to analyze the different tools for the region of Paris to create an economic growth through the project of Greater Paris. Indeed, the government has created La Société du Grand Paris, in order to take in charge the economic issues of the city and comfort its rank of global city. We have seen the actual situation of Paris which is at the moment one of the leading cities in the world in term of GDP. According to Anthony Crenn, the mission of the Greater Pars is to maintain the city in the top ranking, by improving the quality of life of the Parisian, increasing the access to the transports and to favor innovation within Paris Ile-de-France.

Due to academic researches we have seen the conditions to see efficient transport on a regional level, but also on a national one. We have exposed what could be the consequences for an economy by investing in such a project. In our case, we have seen, that this creation could permit an homogeneity of the Parisian territory concerning companies location, and also the benefits to link all the big competitive pole of the region together. Nevertheless, it is important to notice that the research has shown the transports as being only a «support infrastructure» and would be totally inefficient as a single investment. This paper has also demonstrated the real power of this public investment to create some economic growth, without fearing an outflow of capital. We also demonstrated how do such a project impact positively the development of IT, generates a higher productivity of R&D, and can also help to the creation of a green cluster.

Unfortunately this paper presents some limits; the most evident would be the difficulty to forecast the real impact. Indeed, it is difficult to assume the future consequences of this project, as all the academic data used in this paper are all concerning specific regions. Also the political aspect of this project makes it more difficult to obtain unbiased findings. The project being young does not permit to have precise information on the project: the way it will be financed, where exactly the train will stop or the name of the constructor of the automatic line which has not been decided yet, or at least has not been communicated.

We have now to see what will be the next steps for the Greater Paris, to see how the construction will advance, and new projects will be proposed. The evolution of Parisian mind will be also really interesting to investigate. At the moment, the social differences better inner Parisians and people living in the suburbs are strong, it will be interesting to analyze if the geographic closeness created thanks to the new public transport infrastructure will also impact the social differences by mixing all the social classes? Does this project will really impact the national economy? Do the other French regions will not suffer from a capital too powerful?

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Le Grand Paris. How would this project generate an economic growth?