Praha 1 will close the last block of Pařížská to cars on Advent weekend evenings, taxis included

For the busiest weeks of the Christmas markets, the approach to Old Town Square from Pařížská is to stop carrying cars in the evenings. Praha 1 says that from 27 November 2026 to 3 January 2027, every Friday, Saturday and Sunday between 16:00 and 22:00, entry from Pařížská towards the square will be restricted. The district announced the measure on 2 November and describes it as a trial.

The signs are to go up on Pařížská just past its junction with Široká, and the ban applies from there towards the square. Delivery and service vehicles keep their access. Taxis do not: the district says plainly that the exemption will not extend to them.

Why this stretch

The reasoning in the district's announcement is about a specific conflict rather than traffic in general. On weekend evenings during the markets, it says, the space between Pařížská and Old Town Square fills with visitors and with cars at the same time. Some drivers are trying to park as close to the square as they can; others drive through to look at the decorations and the lit tree. The stated aim is to cut that traffic in the hours when it is heaviest and to leave more room for people on foot.

Drivers heading on towards Dlouhá are to be sent round by Široká and Dušní: left from Pařížská into Široká, right into Dušní, then left into Dlouhá. Praha 1 says the surrounding streets will otherwise run as normal, and that Prague's municipal police will be on site to help enforce the new regime.

A trial, and what it is measured on

The district is careful to call this a test. It says it will evaluate the measure over the Christmas season, chiefly in terms of the traffic situation and pedestrian movement around Old Town Square. The announcement does not say what result would make it permanent, extend it to other weekends, or end it, nor does it give any count of the cars or visitors it is responding to.

The scope is narrow by design: one block of one street, eighteen hours a week, over six weekends. That is the point worth noticing. It is a small closure, but it is a closure of a car approach to the city's most visited square, written so that the district can measure it, and with taxis deliberately left out of the exemption. Whether Praha 1 publishes the evaluation it has promised is the part to watch once the markets are over.

Note that the source is the district's own announcement, which uses the future tense throughout (the restriction "is to" apply); it does not cite a formal traffic order.