Starting January 1, 2025, there is a chance you will need an environmental sticker to drive to Disneyland Paris, depending on the route you take. Many people from Belgium and the Netherlands drive through Lille (Rijsel) to the A1, which leads to Paris.
However, it is difficult to find accurate information online about which areas in and around Lille fall within the environmental zone. We found two road maps on a website from an article in 2019 that discusses “temporary” environmental zones in Lille. If these temporary zones are now becoming permanent, we can see on these maps where the rules may apply.
Two routes around Lille that you can follow:
On the first map, you can see the first environmental zone I found, which mainly includes the center of Lille and some surrounding areas. Most people take the route marked in yellow on this map, coming from Belgium toward Lille (for example, if you’re coming from Ghent, Antwerp, the Netherlands, etc.). On this map, this yellow road goes right through the environmental zone.
But there is also another route where you don’t need to pass through Lille (Rijsel), marked in red. This is also the route we usually take to avoid traffic towards Lille when driving to Disneyland Paris. On this route, you wouldn’t need an environmental sticker.
BUT I also found the following map:
This second map shows a larger area. The yellow route doesn’t change much, but the red route comes very close to the environmental zone. It’s difficult to know whether this route will be affected or not. There are a few places where the red route passes through the environmental zone, but these are mainly at on- and off-ramps, so it might not apply to through traffic. I haven’t found clearer or more information on this, and I couldn’t find any details in the press in Belgium, such as HLN.
Although I think you won’t need an environmental sticker for the red route, we bought one just to be safe.
IMPORTANT: There are different websites where you can purchase such a sticker, and the prices vary greatly. On this site: https://ecovignetfrankrijk.be/vignet-lille/, where we found the above maps, they charge as much as €20. However, such an environmental sticker should only cost a few euros.
That’s why we continued our search and found this site: https://www.france.fr/nl/artikel/praktische-tips-voor-het-bestellen-van-het-critair-ecovignet/, which is an official government website for tourism in France. We ordered the environmental sticker here, and the cost was only €4.76. So, be cautious of “scam” websites that charge 3 or 4 times more for such a sticker.
