PARIS — The regal Pont des Arts may be one of the most romantic bridges in Paris, at least to judge by the thousands of couples from around the world who have clamped padlocks to the railings as tokens of their desire to be “locked in love forever.”

But forever, it turns out, may be just a few more months, and the romance of the ritual may be limited to the eye of the beholder.

The future of the practice turned decidedly bleak on Friday, as city officials announced a trial experiment to remove the padlocks and replace some of the railings along the bridge with thick glass to prevent couples from attaching new ones. Official estimates put the number of locks hanging on the bridge at more than 700,000. The load averaged about 500 kilograms for each panel.

City officials took the measure to combat what was once an intimate rite that, to many local residents, had become a blight. The ritual has spread to other bridges — the Pont de l’Archevêché and the Passerelle Simone de Beauvoir — provoking a public battle between historical preservation and tourism interests, and prompting the new mayor, Anne Hidalgo, to direct a deputy to find new ways to express love.