On Monday, the Parisian executive presented a charter for transitional urban planning. This charter is intended to provide a framework for common-sense practices, most often initiated by real estate operators - both private and public - while they obtain all the necessary administrative and regulatory authorizations to begin construction.
Over the years, this method has become a living laboratory for testing new uses: artists' collectives, hostels for people in precarious or excluded situations, start-up incubators...
Joachim Azan(Novaxia), Simon Laisney(Plateau Urbain) and Loïs Moulas(OID) argued that "temporary urban planning is one of the solutions to be deployed on a large scale in tomorrow's urban planning" in an article published on Business Immo last June. This charter could be a first step in the right direction, provided it doesn't become yet another political recuperation of a form of administrative negligence. After all, there's always the risk of adding another layer to an indigestible "mille-feuille".
Jean-Louis Missika, deputy mayor of Paris in charge of urban planning, architecture, Greater Paris projects, economic development and attractiveness, justifies the need for this charter by the desire not to "freeze square meters" at a time when they are skyrocketing in the capital. We don't want this charter to be just a mask for empty buildings. After all, if you have the ambition to transform the city, you have to take responsibility for your projects. Paris is not far behind. The daily Le Parisien 's Data unit lists no fewer than 8,000 worksites in progress, of which a minority (less than 700) are managed by the City of Paris.
The temporary nature of these projects should not obscure the need to reinvent urban planning that is more flexible, more agile and more adaptable, in order to meet the social, economic and environmental challenges facing major metropolises.
Above all, the temporary must remain... temporary. After all, the crux of the matter is to restore permanent uses to places left fallow by an administrative machinery that has become too complex and consequently too slow. The commitment to "mobilize public authorities to ensure more rapid examination of authorizations" is a little light.
Guillaume Poitrinal, co-chairman of Woodeum and author of the book "Plus vite, la France malade de son temps", reminded us in a tweet that the decision to close the Hôtel Saint-Vincent-de-Paul - a symbol of successful transitional urbanism - dates back to... 2004.