When the streets are narrow and congested, restaurants have terraces that take up significant parts of the roadway. You don’t get that in the UK.  Food is not more important than traffic flow. And you pay more for a coffee if you sit amongst the French traffic fumes and noise. Look at diner’s plates. If you see tinned green beans, the rest of the food is likely to be from a frozen food supplier. If there are hundreds of things on the menu, there is no chef preparing it to order. Look for the label ‘fait maison’ if you want home-made food.