This is the mother of all cities. The greatest planned community ever achieved and the best example of human building cities for humans.
Even la defense is a refined and polished piece of urbanism. Cities in the rest of the world, particularly in booming asia should take cues from paris instead of North American cities.
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Those overhead pics of old Paris make the city seem so totalitarian. Every thing is the same height, the Eiffel tower watches over everything...
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This is because it is a totalitarian work. No open democracy could ever build such a cohesive city in such a short amount of time. Emperor Napoleon III ordered the city of Paris to be completely razed and rebuilt in the 1860's. Before this Paris was a chaotic medieval city with insane density which resulted in unsanitary conditions. The city was designed to be orderly and allow for large armies to move easily (presumably to be more efficient in the event of riots and rebellions).
Paris is for all intense and purposes a city built on the principle of order, from its large boulevards to its second empire architecture.
I love it!