Saint-Étienne, France · Low emission zone
Official name Zone à faibles émissions mobilité (ZFE-m) de Saint-Étienne Métropole
In force in Saint-Étienne right nowTuesday, 13 October 2026 at 11:03 · Europe/Paris
The zone is always on, but it reaches only goods vehicles. A car or a motorcycle is unaffected at every hour of every day, whatever this timetable says is in force.
The Métropole's exclusion of cars and motorcycles is qualified in its own sentence — they may drive freely 'en dehors des périodes de pics de pollution'. A pollution episode is declared by the prefect under a separate national measure, is not part of this zone, and is not tracked in this record.
A step is dated but not yet in force: from 1 January 2027 the ban extends to Crit'Air 3 lorries and vans. It still does not reach cars.
Operating times only, read from the source below. It does not check your vehicle.
Saint-Étienne runs a 200 km² low emission zone that no car is ever in. The Métropole restricts only heavy goods vehicles and light commercial vans carrying goods; it says in its own words that cars and motorcycles are excluded from the scheme and may drive freely.
If you are arriving by car, of any age and any Crit'Air class, this zone does not reach you — the only thing that can stop you here is a prefectural pollution episode, which is a separate national measure.
There is no charge and no day pass. This scheme bans vehicles, it does not price entry: a lorry or van in a restricted class may not be here at all, and everything else is free to drive in.
Permanent. The Métropole states the zone is regulated 365 days a year, 7 days a week, 24 hours a day, and that access for the vehicles concerned is prohibited at all times.
Since 1 January 2025 the zone covers 200 km² and follows the main road axes, with 350,000 people living inside it. Four major roads are explicitly left out of it: the M201, the N88, the A47 and the A72.
The rule is not about your fuel and, for a car, it is not about you at all. Since 1 January 2025 the ban covers heavy goods vehicles, vans and small vans that are unclassified or carry a Crit'Air 4 or 5 sticker. From 1 January 2027 it extends to Crit'Air 3 vehicles of those same categories. Cars and motorcycles are outside the scheme at every step.
Saint-Étienne does not split the rule by fuel. Access is decided by the Crit'Air class of a goods vehicle, and Crit'Air already encodes fuel and age together. The classes are recorded under the petrol standard.
Next scheduled re-check: 2026-12-11.
This is owed on the country's roads, not inside this scheme. What France asks, with the source