John Lichfield: Our Man In Paris – John Lichfield, Commentators – The Independent

The urban motorway which hugs the boundary of Paris proper is a sort of 10-lane medieval city wall. Inside the Périphérique is the beautiful city beloved of tourists and the home, for the most part, of the white and the well-off. Outside the Périphérique are the banlieues, a few of them leafy, wealthy and white; some of them poor and abandoned and dangerous; most of them a dynamic, incoherent, multiracial jumble.

President Nicolas Sarkozy took a bold, and somewhat puzzling, initiative last week. He selected 10 teams to think up visions for a “Greater Paris”. They will report back next year.

The idea is sensible and long overdue. But President Sarkozy’s initiative has, nonetheless, puzzled and alarmed many people. The Elysée Palace has jumped straight to the building stage. The Socialist leadership of the Paris town hall and the greater Paris area have been kept at arm’s length.

Critics fear that M. Sarkozy has no real interest in breaking down the invisible wall between Paris and its banlieues. Instead, they say, his plan is a smokescreen behind which property developers will be encouraged to create vast, new satellite cities of offices. Already, plans are going ahead for three new tower blocks.

Interesting report from the Paris known to us from La Haine and Caché.

The North Circular as sociologically significant boundary??