BERTRAND DELANOE

Mayor, Paris, France

Chosen because: Delanoe, 61, has spearheaded an ambitious car-sharing program called Autolib, which will launch this fall. Paris will introduce 3,000 bubble-shaped electric cars at 1,000 self-serve rental charging stations around the city and suburbs. Paris selected a four-seat battery electric vehicle produced by Bollore. Autolib is the next step in Delanoe's plan to attack Paris' notorious traffic jams. In 2007, he introduced a bicycle sharing program called Velib. Among Delanoe's other famous initiatives was Paris Plage (Paris beach), which closed the George Pompidou Expressway along the Seine River downtown during part of the summer and turned it into an urban Riviera, replete with potted palms.

Quote: As he was campaigning for mayor, Delanoe promised to "fight, with all the means at my disposal, against the harmful, ever-increasing and unacceptable hegemony of the automobile."