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Grand Paris

Métropole covering Paris and its nearest surrounding suburbs

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The métropole came into existence after Sarkozy's presidency on 1 January 2016; it comprises 130 communes, including Paris and all 123 communes in the surrounding inner-suburban departments of the Petite Couronne (Hauts-de-Seine, Seine-Saint-Denis and Val-de-Marne), plus seven communes in two of the outer-suburban departments, including the communes of Argenteuil in Val-d'Oise, Savigny-sur-Orge, Juvisy-sur-Orge, Athis-Mons, Viry-Châtillon and Paray-Vieille-Poste in Essonne, the last of which covers part of Orly Airport. Part of the métropole comprises the former Seine department, which existed from 1795 to 1968.

Grand Paris covers 814 square kilometers (314 square miles), and has a population of over 7 million. The métropole is administered by a metropolitan council of 210 members, not directly elected, but chosen by the councils of the member communes. Its responsibilities include urban planning, housing, as well as environment protection.

History

The idea of Greater Paris was originally proposed by French President Nicolas Sarkozy as "a new global plan for the Paris metropolitan region" It first led to a new transportation master plan for the Paris region and to plans to develop several areas around Paris. The "Métropole du Grand Paris" was defined by the law of 27 January 2014 on the modernization of public territorial action and affirmation of cities as part of Act III of decentralization. The plans were considerably modified in December 2015, and the passage into action in two competences, economic development and protection of the environment was delayed from 2016 to 2017.

The plan was first announced on 17 September 2007 during the inauguration of "La Cité de l'architecture et du patrimoine", when Sarkozy declared his intent to create a "new comprehensive development project for Greater Paris". The project was organized by the French state, with the Minister of Culture and Communication charged with coordinating the consultation process.

In 2008 an international urban and architectural competition for the future development of metropolitan Paris was launched. Ten teams gathering architects, urban planners, geographers, landscape architects will offer their vision for building a Paris metropolis of the 21st century in the post-Kyoto era and make a prospective diagnosis for Paris and its suburbs that will define future developments in Greater Paris for the next 40 years.

The architects leading the ten multi-disciplinary teams were: Jean Nouvel, Christian de Portzamparc, Antoine Grumbach, Roland Castro, Yves Lion, Djamel Klouche, Richard Rogers, Bernardo Secchi, Paola Viganò, Finn Geipel, Giulia Andi, and Winy Maas.

Early versions of the plan proposed reforms to the local government structure of the Paris region by creating an integrated urban community encompassing the City of Paris and the surrounding Petite Couronne, however these were largely abandoned due to strong opposition from the socialist Mayor of Paris, Bertrand Delanoë, and the socialist head of the Île-de-France region, Jean-Paul Huchon.

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