Boulevard Haussmann
Baron Haussmann has been described as ‘The man who created Paris’. He has also
been called ‘the man who destroyed Paris’.
The Second Empire lasted from 1852 to 1870. Napoleon
III wanted to modernise his capital, and at the same time to make revolutions
impossible.
Having led
a successful revolution himself, he knew what was needed; broad avenues instead
of little narrow streets.
Then rebels couldn’t block the streets with
barricades; troops could be rushed across the city when needed;
artillery could command long
fields of fire, and the cavalry could get a good run at the mob.
Baron Haussmann was appointed Prefect of the Seine,
which meant Boss of Paris, and set to work on reconstruction.
He had broad streets built in
all the gaps where old city walls had been,
and others running across town between them and
meeting in grand squares. He converted all the waste ground where plotters met
into parks,
and
generally streamlined and updated everything. The ring roads where walls had
been he called Boulevards (bulwarks).
The streets themselves here are very broad, the
pavements even broader; there are rows of trees for shade,
and the buildings on either
side were limited by law to a height of six stories
(not counting the basement and
the roof, which often contains another two floors).
These new streets soon became
the centre of Parisian life, and so the great Department stores sprang up along
them,
especially on the
Boulevard Haussmann, where two stores – PRINTEMPS and GALERIES LAFAYETTE –
have domes designed by Gustave Eiffel, and
roof-gardens with interesting views.
Incidentally, the scheme worked. No revolution has
succeeded on the streets of Paris since.
