71–80 of 107 posts
Of course, old Paris is no more ! I live near Paris, and I go in this town only when I am forced to. Residential intensification, insecurity (pickpockets in the metro), migrants, Paris nowadays has nothing to do with the romantic vision of American people. Real Parisians now live in the suburb, there is some very nice towns in the suburbs. (Others not so nice, it depends where you go).
Which suburbs are nice?
Of course, old Paris is no more ! I live near Paris, and I go in this town only when I am forced to. Residential intensification, insecurity (pickpockets in the metro), migrants, Paris nowadays has nothing to do with the romantic vision of American people. Real Parisians now live in the suburb, there is some very nice towns in the suburbs. (Others not so nice, it depends where you go).
Which suburbs are nice?
One difference between Haussmann and others is that his buildings turned out to create one of the most beautiful cities in the world. In contrast, 20's century urbanism projects - even on a smaller scale - are almost always considered a failure ex post. In Paris itself, walk yourself through the Les Olympiades area, from Tolbiac down to Porte d'Italie, if you like an impressive testament to that fact. Some other favo…
This is unrelated to the topic, but your comment is a good occasion to learn more about what seems to me to be weird (grammatical) article usages by English speakers. Why did you call it _Les_ Olympiades, and not Olympiades (no article) or _the_ Olympiades (article in English), or _les_ Olympiades (no capitalization of the article) ? For Porte d'Italie, you did not add any article, i.e. Porte d'Italie and not _La_ Po…
And also because people who speak about Les Olympiades in English call it Les Olympiades, in a deliberate effort to distinguish it from the Métro station.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The French article repeatedly refers to it as _Les_ Olympiades.
The article is capitalized only when it is the beginning of a sentence, or for the elementary school of the same name. The article behaves "normally" (eg switches to aux Olympiades when needed) while the English article stick to Les Olympiades with a capitalized "Les". Interestingly, both articles first words are "Les Olympiades", but: * "Les" is in bold in the English one, as if it was part of the name, while only "…
Porte d'Italy on the other hand is clear, there's only one interpretation, and therefore the article is not part of the name.
I am not saying this is right, just my brain doing brain things. I apologize if correctness is important for you, I will try to be more precise going foward.
One difference between Haussmann and others is that his buildings turned out to create one of the most beautiful cities in the world. In contrast, 20's century urbanism projects - even on a smaller scale - are almost always considered a failure ex post. In Paris itself, walk yourself through the Les Olympiades area, from Tolbiac down to Porte d'Italie, if you like an impressive testament to that fact. Some other favo…
By whom? It's a matter of perspective. If you're into architecture and design you'll care more about the practicality and function of the building than it's exterior appearance. A sterile exterior then becomes an indicator that the budget went into what matters most. In my personal opinion, the exterior of buildings (excluding windows) should all be considered public space, they should be open for decoration, like st…
First, reception by audiences such as tourists. What is on their vacation photographs? Boulevards, or high rises of Italie 13?
Second, by the people who live there. The Olympiades never attracted the successful young professionals they were intended for, and in that sense, were not successful in their design. It may indeed often be the case that some modernist areas are in fact quite nice and comfortable to live in - I do not know. But at the very least they did not turn out to be as desirable as they were planned.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's not just historic fantasy though, there was opposition to his way, but they didn't have the political clout nor could oppose centering the cities around cars. It's not just Haussmann either, most countries had that tension around letting cars dominate or not (there was an excellent 99pi episode about these tensions [0]), it just happened that one side massively won benefiting from economics, politics and power d…
I think you need better evidence for this tension than an episode that's talking about a different country half a century later (the time difference is especially important, because the changes to Paris took place at a time when cars were still being invented, e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benz_Patent-Motorwagen "widely regarded as the world's first production automobile" was patented in 1885, 15 years after the…
Haussmann succeeded mostly because of the emperor's constant backup and the basically no limit budget he got from him. Once these backings were gone he was out of the game.
He wasn't otherwise very well supported by the people. I kinda like this quote:
> In his memoires, Haussmann had this comment on his dismissal: "In the eyes of the Parisians, who like routine in things but are changeable when it comes to people, I committed two great wrongs; over the course of seventeen years I disturbed their daily habits by turning Paris upside down, and they had to look at the same face of the Prefect in the Hotel de Ville. These were two unforgivable complaints."[17]
Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is unrelated to the topic, but your comment is a good occasion to learn more about what seems to me to be weird (grammatical) article usages by English speakers. Why did you call it _Les_ Olympiades, and not Olympiades (no article) or _the_ Olympiades (article in English), or _les_ Olympiades (no capitalization of the article) ? For Porte d'Italie, you did not add any article, i.e. Porte d'Italie and not _La_ Po…
The definite article makes sense in this case, since it's a specific place and not a category, "les" because that's how you'd probably see it written if mentioned out of context elsewhere[0], and capitalized (against French convention) because proper names are typically capitalized in English, including articles. And also because people who speak about Les Olympiades in English call it Les Olympiades, in a deliberate…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Poundbury in Dorchester (UK) was nothing but plain grass in the 1990'ies. Now Poundbury is a city that has generated more new jobs than new homes. The price for real estate is 30% higher than neighbouring cities. And they have yet to experience a traffic accident. Beautiful walkable cities is good for business.
An other interesting new urbanism project — though I'd have a hard time calling it "beautiful" — is Louvain-La-Neuve in Belgium: a completely planned city resulting from the split of the "Catholic University of Leuven" into the flemish KU Leuven and the walloon UCL the city was set up such that the city center is entirely pedestrian, cars within the city center travel below the giant concrete slab which makes up the…
But it manages to give a pretty cosy impression, and with a night life that punches much above the weight of its population otherwise would indicate. Also they gave some good crepes there.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Poundbury in Dorchester (UK) was nothing but plain grass in the 1990'ies. Now Poundbury is a city that has generated more new jobs than new homes. The price for real estate is 30% higher than neighbouring cities. And they have yet to experience a traffic accident. Beautiful walkable cities is good for business.
An other interesting new urbanism project — though I'd have a hard time calling it "beautiful" — is Louvain-La-Neuve in Belgium: a completely planned city resulting from the split of the "Catholic University of Leuven" into the flemish KU Leuven and the walloon UCL the city was set up such that the city center is entirely pedestrian, cars within the city center travel below the giant concrete slab which makes up the…
Of course, old Paris is no more ! I live near Paris, and I go in this town only when I am forced to. Residential intensification, insecurity (pickpockets in the metro), migrants, Paris nowadays has nothing to do with the romantic vision of American people. Real Parisians now live in the suburb, there is some very nice towns in the suburbs. (Others not so nice, it depends where you go).
Which suburbs are nice?
[0] https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Revenu_fiscal_par_m%C3%A9nage_...