© AFP / Ludovic MARINParisians are getting away while they can
The new restrictions, announced by Prime Minister Jean Castex late on Thursday, apply to around a third of the country's population affecting Paris and several other regions in the north and south.
The government has insisted that the new month-long lockdown will be more limited than the two others imposed last year, with schools open and outdoor exercise allowed for an unlimited amount of time.
Comment: What with the nonsensical, ever changing rules it's becoming increasingly difficult to deny that these lockdowns are more of a warped psychological game than a scientifically backed strategy.
© AFP / Ludovic MARINBut the approach of the new curbs in Paris encouraged many to leave the notoriously cramped city
Comment: A luxury that a great many cannot afford.
A spokesperson for national rail operator SNCF told AFP that trains for those destinations were now fully booked after having a 60-70 percent level of occupancy on previous Fridays.
Trains leaving Montparnasse station in Paris -- which serves destinations in Brittany and the southwest -- were completely full after a rush of bookings late Thursday.
Maiwenn, a 19-year old student clutching a giant suitcase, said she had decided to leave Paris to spend the rest of the university year with her family in Saint-Brieuc in Brittany.
"I'm going to stay there until the end of the term," scheduled for mid-April, she said. "It's been roughly a year that our courses have been on distance learning so we're starting to get used to it."
Comment: With governments slashing funding for education, more than ever universities rely on tuition fees, and with international students staying away - particularly those from Asian nations who often pay triple the fees - it's likely that many more will see no benefit in paying for a university education that no longer guarantees a job when you leave anyway. There's also the fact that many 'university towns' have come to rely on students for their businesses to be profitable.
The other regions affected by the new measures notably include the Hauts-de-France region of northeast France which covers the city of Lille, and the Alpes-Maritimes on the Mediterranean, as well as Seine-Maritime and the Eure in the north.
Health Minister Olivier Veran expressed hope that this regional lockdown would be the last, with the situation helped by the onset spring and the vaccination campaign.
As in previous lockdowns, a form written out or downloaded on a phone will be needed to justify why a person has left the home in areas under the new restrictions.
Outdoor exercise is allowed up to 10 kilometres (six miles) from home for an unlimited amount of time but non-essential shops will have to close.
However bookshops -- deemed as essential to public wellbeing -- can stay open and government spokesman Gabriel Attal said hair salons could also remain open with reinforced sanitary protocols.
Comment: For anyone paying attention, it was clear that once Germany and Italy began to talk about yet another lockdown that, as has happened repeatedly, other European nations under sway of the increasingly apparent, nefarious agenda, would soon fall into lockstep.