The mayor of Paris, France wants to ban all cars 17 years or older from city streets by 2014.

The proposal Socialist party mayor Bertrand Delanoë brought before city council November 12 would ban all "old bangers" from the city, to better air quality and cut down noise pollution.

Trucks and buses more than 18 years old and motorcycles built before 2004 would also be banned, reports the U.K.'s Telegraph.

While drivers of older vehicles worry the ban would effectively turn Paris into "an island for the rich," the Socialist party promised that if the ban went ahead September 2014, they'd at the same time launch a "cash-for-clunkers"-type program to help poorer people into newer cars.

The move is part of a plan to make Paris a "low-emission zone" and cut air pollution 30 percent by 2015. French officials chalk up about 43,000 deaths annually to poor air quality, but Delanoë is hoping, too, to avoid new European air pollution fines, due out 2016.

Other elements of the plan include reducing local speed limits from 80 km/h (50 mph) to 70 km/h (43 mph); bumping up the number of 30 km/h (19 mph) zones in the city; and slapping an eco-tax on heavier vehicles travelling in the city centre.

Delanoë's war on "the hegemony of the automobile" has already seen him introduce electric car-sharing programs and pedestrianize roads along the Siene, driving up traffic congestion but pacifying Parisian non-motorists, who make up a majority in the city.

Older cars make up only three percent of the 4.5 million vehicles in the Paris region, reports the Telegraph. Critics say the plan should emphasize cutting down the use of pollutive diesel fuels instead.

(The Telegraph)