I. SETTING THE SCENE

WIND, RIVER, TRADE ROUTES, RAMPARTS... AND A HILL

Prevailing winds push pollution east, which explains why wealthy districts are in the west, blue-collar in the east.*

*As for the whole northern hemisphere, unless sea winds or social factors intervene.

--  Map, Sophie Dressler, "A Bridge over Time," 2018 (in French); wind, Harald Wolff

Transferring production to places with cheap labor, car pollution and the grand construction of the 1980's (the City of Sciences, the Ministry of Finance, Opéra Bastille) attenuate the separation between east and west, but museums, monuments and luxury establishments are almost always in the west, while cultural dynamism is mainly in the east where rents are more affordable. 

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Add medieval trade routes and medieval and later ramparts, which the métro map reveals. Straight lines follow trade routes, curved lines ramparts: Both avoid house foundations.

Adapted from the map of the transport authority (the RATP)

Chatelet, the trade route junction where five local and three regional métro lines connect, is among the busiest métro stations in Europe.

The arrow indicates the oldest routes. 

 

The Tour Saint-Jacques (Saint-Jacques Tower) where the oldest trade routes met, is still the center of town. The arrow shows the trade and pilgrimage route south (rue Saint-Jacques, toward Saint-James of Compostela in Spain).

 

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Eleventh-century trade routes 

           Adapted from a plan in Un Jour de plus à Paris / zoom (please scroll down)  

1. The east-west route dates from the Gauls. Supplying the merchants and their animals encouraged local production, and explains why the right bank has always been more commercial than the left (except under the Romans, when the main route led to Rome). 

Following this route is the Grand Axis, which by starting at the eastern end of the Louvre palace to merge with the horizon is one of the most influential urban designs of all time. The grandiose squares of the 19th century, built to let soldiers gather before confronting street rebellions in working-class eastern Paris, lie along that line as well.

 

2. The Romans' north / south route still cuts through the city (becoming rues Saint-Martin / Saint Jacques in the north and south respectively).  

3. A minor route that led to the distant hinterland of Britain surpassed it in importance when it led past relics and the royal graves (rue Saint-Denis).

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Ramparts encircled the growing town:

Simplification of an Internet map

Laurent Grandguillot

The last rampart is the superhighway that circles the city.

• They explain why...

• Neighborhoods split into distinct segments along the medieval rue Saint-Denis. 

 

• Saint-Germain-des-Prés became one of the most intellectual neighborhoods on the planet.

 

• The "dance of the barriers" — the cancan — grew up in blue-collar outskirts just beyond toll-collecting ramparts.

 

• A conservative government armed and trained an underclass fighting force, whose presence led to La Commune.

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Hovering over all, a hill whose significance has been

religious, military and political: more later.

Piéta of Saint-Germain-des-Prés (detail), anonymous, 15th century / zoom

Those tangible factors explain the city's structure.

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Next,

II.

The players who make France distinct