The prefect of Hérault has issued an order to prohibit these illegal gatherings throughout 2025. On the ground, for elected officials and local residents, this measure goes in the right direction. Reactions.
The prefect of Hérault, by issuing an order last week banning rave parties for the year 2025, declared war on the organizers. This tool, useful to law enforcement to prevent these gatherings, is also intended to be symbolic. By its perimeter – the entire department – and its amplitude – one year. “I want us to know that Hérault is not a suitable department for organizing rave parties”explained François-Xavier Lauch recently. He was also pleased that no festive gathering took place in Hérault for New Year's Eve. The partygoers – some of whom came from Spain and Italy – had pushed as far as Larzac, in Aveyron.
In 2024, the year during which several banning orders were issued, 17 rave parties took place illegally in Hérault, compared to 47 in 2023.
Mayors approve the measure
Overall, the mayors concerned approve the new prefectural decree but are waiting to see. This is the case of Ronny Poncé, mayor of Aumelas, a favorite destination for ravers between Gignac, Cournonsec and Villeveyrac. “It’s a very good thing for mayors and citizens, but we have to be careful.” If the year has been calm – the last rave party in his town dates back to November 2023 – the elected official has not forgotten the damage caused by the presence of 5,000 partygoers. Noise pollution, “heard throughout the valley as far as Montpeyroux”constitute the main nuisance. Although the town has only 600 inhabitants, they are scattered among farmhouses, some of which offer tourist accommodation. The mayor also deplores incivility. “We found tags on the Saint-Martin-du-Cardonnet chapel and the cars parked on the meadow where a herd usually grazes.” Not to mention the harm to biodiversity, in the heart of a Natura 2000 classified area, and the fire risk. A WhatsApp group was created with residents to alert in the event of “abnormal traffic”: “Everyone plays the game, we notify the gendarmerie who position vehicles at key locations.”
“In the morning, it’s like we’re in Walking Dead”
President of the Garrigue en danger association, Frédéric Gleyze is also “very satisfied” of this decree: “We had already asked the previous prefect for it. It is a tool that has proven itself in other departments.” In addition to the detrimental absence of sanitary facilities, he points to the circulation of drugs and an increasingly young public. “In the morning, it’s like we’re in Walking Dead!”
To the south of the Aumelas plateau, the town of Villeveyrac is also impacted. Christophe Morgo remembers a rave which brought together more than 6,000 people in 2021 on the Aumelas plateau. “Since then, each time a gathering is announced, we rock up on Friday to close access to the large DFCI wind turbine track, with the Pézenas gendarmerie and Department services. But these are heavy-handed means because it is necessary to be able, in the event of a fire, to remove the rocks in one hour, day or night. The prefect's decision is going in the right direction. But the problem has been moved elsewhere.” The elected official nevertheless attempted dialogue: “We had met the rave organizers. I wanted to be able to accompany them once or twice a year, being in direct contact with them. They are nice people. But we cannot organize gatherings in the middle of summer in a red zone , with a high fire risk.”
There needs to be a national solution
In the Haut Cantons of Béziers, not far from the border with Tarn, Max Alliès, the mayor of Castanet-le-Haut, also knows the subject well. Last fall, there were more than a thousand teufers under the wind turbines. A site which had been stormed four or five times in 2023. “The No. 1 concern is that there is no incident”he worries. During the recent rave, for the first time, the material was seized by the authorities, in agreement with the Béziers public prosecutor's office. A toughening of tone which goes in the right direction for the elected official, if only to avoid inequalities compared to those who respect the regulations in force. Max Alliès, however, remains open to debate: “Certain departments have identified places that are easier to secure. There needs to be a national solution otherwise we will pass the buck from one department to another…”
“Youth has the right to party” for Free Thought
La Libre Pensée, which has countless reasons for disagreement with the prefect, disapproves of the order banning rave parties. “This measure is taken for apparently reasonable reasons, indicates the association in the preamble. But… There are no more risks in rave parties than in all parties where many people gather.” The association fears “a total ban with the repression that will follow”.
“Very good news” for Ingrid Chapuis from the Le Son du silence association
“It’s not a victory because we’re not at war, but it’s very good news for us!”
From her village of Boisset located in the Hauts Cantons of Béziers, Ingrid Chapuis welcomes the decision of the prefect of Hérault. President of the “Le son du silence” association, which has around fifty members, she has been campaigning for two years to put an end to these wild parties. “This decision is very important, it reveals the great support that the prefect gives us”continues the president of the association.
Especially since the phenomenon has only become more pronounced over the last ten years: “There was a snowball effect. In 2023 we had around twenty wild festivals in the Haut-Languedoc park, that’s around half of all those organized in the Hérault department.”
She denounces harmful effects “for the fauna and flora as much as for the health of the inhabitants” (the sub-bass would be audible 10 km away). More generally, it is her living environment that she considers to have deteriorated: “After all, if we live here it’s for the peace and quiet.”
