Mayhem on the roads of Île-de-France because of the flakes that fell last night. This snowy episode, which was not expected at such intensity by Météo-France, stranded hundreds of motorists, mainly in the southwest of Paris. A peak in traffic jams was thus reached at 1 a.m., with more than 150 kilometers of traffic jams accumulated in Île-de-France at this time, according to the Sytadin road information service.
At the peak of the disturbances at the start of the night, “around 1000 vehicles were blocked on the A13”, indicated the Minister of Transport Clément Beaune on RMC this Tuesday morning. And the struggle for Ile-de-France motorists is far from over. Around 400 vehicles, mainly on the A13, were still trapped in the snow at 7:30 a.m., according to Clément Beaune.
An A13 motorway which was temporarily closed in the direction of Paris, between Orgeval and Rocquencourt, “due to difficult traffic conditions and accidents on the tracks”, reports Sytadin. The same is true of the A12 motorway, where several accidents also occurred last night. “All the salt spreaders of the Roads Department are mobilized,” Clément Beaune wrote on X (ex-Twitter) during the night.
If, until 6:30 a.m. this Tuesday, traffic on the Ile-de-France roads was at an exceptional level, with approximately 50 km of cumulative traffic jams, the traffic jam curve has since returned to a usual level, with 350 km of traffic jams at 8:30 a.m. We must still expect difficulties on the roads of Ile-de-France this Tuesday morning. “As the weather situation and traffic conditions could deteriorate in the morning, users of private vehicles are invited to limit their road travel,” recommends the Paris Police Prefecture in a press release.
Essonne and Yvelines are placed by Météo-France on orange snow-ice alert until midday. And the disruptions on the roads should extend to Normandy this morning, since Eure, Orne, Calvados and Manche have joined the two Ile-de-France departments on orange alert. The circulation of school transport was thus prohibited this Tuesday morning in Calvados and Orne. Elsewhere in France, accidents due to snow have been observed in Sarthe and Haute-Vienne.