Michael Diamante, New Urbanism Facebook Group
A bit dilapidated section of rue Pierre Timbaud in Gennevilliers (Paris area) was transformed to mixed use buildings in historism style.
There are many new fashion words in today’s urban planning. To mention a few we have “placemaking”, “walkability” and “sustainability”. What most planners fail to understand is that none of today’s challenges are new. The demands of today’s city doesn’t differ that much from the city of the early 1900s. Officials then planned according to needs of mobility, hygiene, greenery and unlike today also beauty. What they succeeded with then were the most livable and resilient cities ever created. Thus, success should be found in emulating their planning rather then trying to reinvent the wheel. One country that has a great many new traditionalist urbanism projects is France. By recreating the conditions of the older city parts, they create vibrant streets that are successful from the start.This project is from the inner suburbs of Paris. A dead street was given life with height regulated low rises in a simple but aesthetic traditional inspired style, tram connection and beautiful cobbled stoned pavement. Some but not all houses have storefronts in the base level. Incroyable.
Project completion: 2014
Architect firm: Organic Architecture (https://www.organic.archi/)
Walkable Brevard 