Paris
Re: Paris
I spent a lot of time in Paris while doing my graduate work and back on Minnescraper I'd posted a fair amount about Paris. It's the densest city in the western world, but at an average density of 54,000 people per square mile for its entire 40 square miles, it's also the fifth or sixth densest entire core city of substantive size in the world, depending on how exactly that's counted. Only the two cities of the Manila Metro (Manila and Caloocan), Chennai, Delhi, and Calcutta are denser; and in the entire list of all whole cities, all the small cities with higher densities are suburbs of one of these six cities, including four inner Paris suburbs that are actually denser than Paris (but also quite small), with the funny exceptions of Neapoli in Greece (population ~30k) and Saint-Josse-ten-Noode, a tiny suburb of Brussels in Belgium (population ~24k) (source).
Anyway, Paris proper is approx. 2.2 million over 40 square miles for a density of 54,000 per sq mi and is still almost entirely contained within the Blvd. Peripherique, which was built in the gap where the city's walls used to be. Outside the Peripherique, especially to the east and southeast, are dense old cities such as Vincennes, in the Val-de-Marne department which are almost just like the city proper and about identical in density. To the west the immediate "suburbs" in Hauts-de-Seine are also denser than Manhattan, richer than Paris proper, and contain France's primary business and skyscraper district, La Défense. Just outside the city to north and northeast are the infamous Seine-Saint-Denis "suburbs" of Saint-Denis and Bobigny, which have very high immigrant populations and high poverty.
These three departments completely wrap the city of Paris and are known as the "petite couronne" or inner ring (or more literally, "little crown"). All three of these extra-Parisian departments have densities rivaling big American cities across their entire area: Hauts-de-Seine covers 68 sq mi and has 1.6 million residents, for a density of 23,000 per sq mi; Seine-Saint-Denis covers 91 sq mi with 1.5 million for 17,000 per sq. mi; and Val-de-Marne covers 95 sq mi with 1.3 million for 14,000 per sq. mi. Together, their population of ~4.4 million is more than double Paris, giving everything inside the "inner ring" a population of 6.7 million over 294 square miles, giving an average density of 23,000 people per square mile.
Why all this detail about Paris' inner suburbs? Because they may soon become Paris. Sarkozy proposed merging almost the entirety of Metropolitan Paris into a grand city several years back and that was universally unpopular so I didn't realize that a narrower version of the same scheme appears to be moving forward. City Lab has some good coverage of it: http://www.citylab.com/politics/2013/07 ... deal/6345/. The plan right now appears to be that the three departments making up the Petite Couronne will be merged into the city in the new scheme. On the map, that comprises departments 75 (Paris), 92 (Hauts-de-Seine), 93 (Seine-Saint-Denis), and 94 (Val-de-Marne). The purple-pink area on that map is called the Grande Couronne (big crown or outer ring) and comprises all of metropolitan Paris, with a total population of ~12 million, so this plan will still only bring about half the region's population into the City.
Probably the most interesting and impressive aspect of this all is the transportation plan: The Paris Métro is, with a few marginal exceptions, limited to the City itself, while the RER system, built in the aftermath of WWII as an overlaid regional system, provides a massive secondary subway system in the City with extensive suburban rail duties out in the rest of the Ile de France. The current plan is to spend $40 BILLION solely on expansion of the Métro system with four new fully-automated lines and extension of two fully-automated lines into the Petite Couronne, including a massive radial line that runs through all three departments without going into the City, all as full-fledged subway infrastructure. This project appears to be definite, rolling forward at a massive scale that dwarfs London's recent expansion efforts. CityLab has an article on that too: http://www.citylab.com/commute/2013/04/ ... urbs/5155/.
I have to admit that while this is all interesting and makes a lot of sense, I'm apprehensive about what it will do to central Paris. Paris has managed to buck a lot of worldwide trends with its urban core, which behaves unlike anywhere else in a lot of key ways. Arrogance fuels some of it, sure, but the fact that the core is run entirely by people who completely believe in a dense urban city has allowed it to avoid some of the issues around urbanism that plague other cities. Of course, the high density of the Petite Couronne means that it's not like a bunch of sprawl-centric suburbanites are suddenly going to be voting on the future of the City, but there is definitely a difference of scale and of commitment, so I guess we'll see.
Anyway, Paris proper is approx. 2.2 million over 40 square miles for a density of 54,000 per sq mi and is still almost entirely contained within the Blvd. Peripherique, which was built in the gap where the city's walls used to be. Outside the Peripherique, especially to the east and southeast, are dense old cities such as Vincennes, in the Val-de-Marne department which are almost just like the city proper and about identical in density. To the west the immediate "suburbs" in Hauts-de-Seine are also denser than Manhattan, richer than Paris proper, and contain France's primary business and skyscraper district, La Défense. Just outside the city to north and northeast are the infamous Seine-Saint-Denis "suburbs" of Saint-Denis and Bobigny, which have very high immigrant populations and high poverty.
These three departments completely wrap the city of Paris and are known as the "petite couronne" or inner ring (or more literally, "little crown"). All three of these extra-Parisian departments have densities rivaling big American cities across their entire area: Hauts-de-Seine covers 68 sq mi and has 1.6 million residents, for a density of 23,000 per sq mi; Seine-Saint-Denis covers 91 sq mi with 1.5 million for 17,000 per sq. mi; and Val-de-Marne covers 95 sq mi with 1.3 million for 14,000 per sq. mi. Together, their population of ~4.4 million is more than double Paris, giving everything inside the "inner ring" a population of 6.7 million over 294 square miles, giving an average density of 23,000 people per square mile.
Why all this detail about Paris' inner suburbs? Because they may soon become Paris. Sarkozy proposed merging almost the entirety of Metropolitan Paris into a grand city several years back and that was universally unpopular so I didn't realize that a narrower version of the same scheme appears to be moving forward. City Lab has some good coverage of it: http://www.citylab.com/politics/2013/07 ... deal/6345/. The plan right now appears to be that the three departments making up the Petite Couronne will be merged into the city in the new scheme. On the map, that comprises departments 75 (Paris), 92 (Hauts-de-Seine), 93 (Seine-Saint-Denis), and 94 (Val-de-Marne). The purple-pink area on that map is called the Grande Couronne (big crown or outer ring) and comprises all of metropolitan Paris, with a total population of ~12 million, so this plan will still only bring about half the region's population into the City.
Probably the most interesting and impressive aspect of this all is the transportation plan: The Paris Métro is, with a few marginal exceptions, limited to the City itself, while the RER system, built in the aftermath of WWII as an overlaid regional system, provides a massive secondary subway system in the City with extensive suburban rail duties out in the rest of the Ile de France. The current plan is to spend $40 BILLION solely on expansion of the Métro system with four new fully-automated lines and extension of two fully-automated lines into the Petite Couronne, including a massive radial line that runs through all three departments without going into the City, all as full-fledged subway infrastructure. This project appears to be definite, rolling forward at a massive scale that dwarfs London's recent expansion efforts. CityLab has an article on that too: http://www.citylab.com/commute/2013/04/ ... urbs/5155/.
I have to admit that while this is all interesting and makes a lot of sense, I'm apprehensive about what it will do to central Paris. Paris has managed to buck a lot of worldwide trends with its urban core, which behaves unlike anywhere else in a lot of key ways. Arrogance fuels some of it, sure, but the fact that the core is run entirely by people who completely believe in a dense urban city has allowed it to avoid some of the issues around urbanism that plague other cities. Of course, the high density of the Petite Couronne means that it's not like a bunch of sprawl-centric suburbanites are suddenly going to be voting on the future of the City, but there is definitely a difference of scale and of commitment, so I guess we'll see.
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