Drownout France

Haussman's 6 Story City

The New View. November 16.

The new apartment is on Rue De Mauvais Garçons (Bad Boys) right near the heart of the Marais. 3 minutes walking to Notre Dame, Pompidou, Rue du Temple, Hotel de Ville. And here you see a lovely view that includes the roof of the Pompidou and the lit-up Sacre Coeur.

If you get to any height in this town, you will see big open spaces. A great book at Artazart, an art book shop near the Canal St. Martin in the 10th, was all about Paris from rooftops.

Across those rooftops are so many neighborhoods--upgrading, delapidating, repopulating, going bohemian. All without radical discontinuities of wealth per district -- no Greenpoints in the limits of Paris that I've seen yet -- and without major smashing up of existing infrastructure. Smallish buildings lend themselves to being repurposed.

Haussman's skeleton contains the damage of bad neighborhoods, and provides the shelter for new experiments.

Posted by amol at November 18, 2002 12:53 AM