The Eiffel Tower, one of the world’s most famous landmarks, will get a glass wall built around its base under a plan to provide extra protection against terrorist attacks, a source in the Paris mayor’s office said on Thursday.
The 324-metre-high structure, which gets about seven million visitors a year, already has protective metal fencing around its base, erected temporarily for the Euro football championship of 2016.
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France has been hit by Islamist militant attacks including bombings and shootings in Paris in November 2015 in which 130 people were killed.
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Glass panels two-and-a-half meters high would be erected around the base of the tower as an anti-terrorist measure if the plans are approved, the source said. The project would go before a sites commission and then the environment ministry.
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“We have three aims: improve the look, make access easier and strengthen the protection of visitors and staff,” Jean-Francois Martins, a city official, said in a statement.
The cost of the project will be around 20 million euros (CAD $28 million), le Parisien newspaper said.
Reporting by Chine Labbe; Writing By Richard Balmforth
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