Suburban Paris housing estate gets left behind by urban redevelopment

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/aug/03/paris-sarcelles-housing-estate-culture-closing

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A poster for a film released in 2001 hangs in the white frame over the entrance to the closed cinema. Overlooking Place de France, in the middle of the Grand Ensemble estate at Sarcelles (one of the first, biggest and most notorious of France’s postwar housing projects – the Grands Ensembles that dot the outer suburbs of France’s big cities), the abandoned cinema sets the tone for its surroundings. The black and white paving is coming unstuck and the cafes, pizza joints and Western Union outlets all look dismally tacky. The shopping centre is in slow decline. Just down the road is the Forum des Cholettes, an arts centre that has been closed due to asbestos contamination. Metal fencing surrounds this crumbling bunker. Once an iconic hip-hop venue, it closed in 1999. Now scheduled for demolition, it will be replaced by new housing.

Across the street and over the tracks of the new tram line, the library looks scarcely better. A white safety net clings to its glazed facade, to prevent falling glass from causing accidents. On the inside, wire mesh holds the window frames in place. Over the past 10 years, urban renewal has transformed much of the town. Roads have been redesigned, buildings restored, new schools added ... but the few cultural amenities are in bad shape. This is particularly apparent on the Grand Ensemble (aka Lochères) estate, a new town built in the 1950s, set at some distance from the original village of Sarcelles. More than 37,000 people live on the estate, which now serves as the centre of this small town, east of Paris. It is nevertheless home to the poorest residents.

Many locals are alarmed by the gradual collapse of amenities in Sarcelles. Some are old enough to have watched the Grand Ensemble being built; others grew up there.

Led by Nabil Koskossi, who works for a local NGO, a petition has been put on change.org. It hopes to gain a reprieve for the Forum, which has come to symbolise their struggle. It has a Facebook page, calling for renovation not demolition. Various local figures – such as Eric Aït Si-Ahmed, alias DJ Desh – have pledged their support. “They’re destroying a symbol of social encounter, which used to be open to everyone. The leader of the council would rather fund specific projects for each community,” says Si-Ahmed, who grew up in a nearby tower block.

Koskossi ran in the recent district council elections on a Miscellaneous Left (DG) ticket, his main opponent being the incumbent Socialist (PS) François Pupponi. He claims the whole of Grand Ensemble is being sidelined. “Just over two-thirds of the town’s population live here and there is nothing left in the way of arts. The only amenities that have survived are in the village,” the campaigner says.

A stretch of brownfield sites and high-voltage power lines 3km wide separates the estate from the village, which feels almost like a small country town. Amid the detached houses the local council has refurbished a small auditorium, an arts school and the village hall. The only bookshop in Sarcelles is here too, but on closer inspection it turns out to be a newsagent’s, its window cluttered with telephones and such.

Pupponi, who also heads the National Agency for Urban Renewal (Anru), acknowledges the lack of amenities in the town centre but is convinced that what is needed is large, modern amenities to draw people from across the Val d’Oise département. The next version of the Contrat de ville plan includes a new multi-screen cinema and a concert hall, but both will be sited outside the Grand Ensemble. “We spent a quarter of all our Anru subsidies rehabilitating the part of Lochères most in need of attention, as well as the schools which were in a frightful state. My ambition now is to create modern amenities which will change the image of the town,” Pupponi says, dismissing any criticism as “just political opposition”.

But Koskossi and his allies are not the only ones condemning local council policy. Alain Bideau, former head of the Sarcelles public library, maintains that local cultural amenities have long been neglected. “The Forum, the cinema, the bookshop then the library, which was closed for a year ... you get the impression they’re deliberately running things down,” Bideau says. Didier Arnal, a former PS leader of the Val d’Oise council, who was ousted in the March election, is equally dismayed by the way the town centre has been neglected. “Anru funding should have been used long ago to rejuvenate the cultural amenities, which would in turn have boosted the town centre. But for the past 10 years this doesn’t seem to have been a priority for the local council.”

There is a consensus that the fate of the library is emblematic of the lack of a proper arts policy. In May 2014 the town council closed it on the grounds of safety concerns: a glass roof was in danger of collapsing. The work, it was said, would not take long. A year later, in the thick of the district council election campaign Koskossi voiced his concern about its future in a flyer. A few weeks before the first round of the poll the library reopened, clad in protective netting. “It had to stay closed for 10 months, then all of a sudden it reopens ... Given how little has been done, it’s mystifying,” says a council official. Koskossi is convinced his campaign had some part in it. He is poised to launch another non-profit, Made in Sarcelles, to carry on the struggle with all the artists who have worked in the town over the years. Pupponi has no intention of changing his plans. The next Anru funding round includes a large venue, the Dôme-Arena, on the big brownfield site, and the Maison de la Gravure (a tribute to local engravers) in the village. Still nothing for the Grand Ensemble.

This article appeared in Guardian Weekly, which incorporates material from Le Monde