While I mostly agree with your points, I think it's fair to say that commuting by car to Paris proper has been absolute hell for a while now. Parking is horren

While I mostly agree with your points, I think it's fair to say that commuting by car to Paris proper has been absolute hell for a while now. Parking is horrendously expensive, and it's not always covered by the employer, especially for people not very high up the ladder (think secretaries and even "higher-up" outsourced personnel). I can understand wanting to limit cars and push public transit. But boy, do I feel that PT has been on a steady decline for many years. So people get squeezed from both sides. So there's still an absurd number of cars on the road around rush hour. I can't wait for the new metro lines to open and see how things will change. But I think the main issue is the extreme centralization: every company wants to be in Paris proper or La Defense. There are only so many holes you can dig under a city.