Urban policy: a group denounces the planned dismantling of "Neighborhoods of Tomorrow"

The GIP-Epau (Europe of Architectural and Urban Projects, editor's note), which employs 21 people, has been conducting action research programs for 20 years on themes as diverse as housing, architecture, urban planning or ecological transition, including "Neighborhoods of Tomorrow".

The latter was launched in 2023 by Emmanuel Macron to improve the lives of residents of working-class neighborhoods and to turn ten sites in France into "laboratories for the city of tomorrow".

The winners were announced in early December at the Cité de l'architecture in the presence of three ministers, a sequence which was accompanied by a press briefing from the Elysée and a video from Emmanuel Macon.

"In mid-December 2025, we learned with astonishment of the cessation of missions (of GIP-Epau, editor's note), the drastic reduction of its budget, resulting in the elimination or transfer of its programs," the collective stated in an opinion piece published Monday on the Le Monde website.

"This decision also leads to the unemployment of the 21 employees of GIP-Epau," the opinion piece continues, for whom this "dismantling is part of the mission entrusted by the Prime Minister to senior civil servants tasked with proposing the elimination or merger of a third of the State's operators."

The topics addressed by the interest group "are precisely those that our societies are facing: climate change, environmental crisis, demographic crisis, housing crisis, territorial inequalities," continues the collective, which includes former Minister Delegate for the City Juliette Méadel, President of the Social Union for Housing Emmanuelle Cosse and President of the Order of Architects Christophe Millet.

At the end of December, the Ville et Banlieue association also expressed its "deep incomprehension", calling for the continuity of the system to be guaranteed.

"I am absolutely outraged by what happened when no criticism was made on the substance. Matignon decided that 'Quartiers de demain' would stop abruptly on December 2, contrary to what the ministers and the President of the Republic said," reacted an actor in the program who spoke anonymously to AFP.

"Local authorities are being told that the State will not be there to support them," this source continues, denouncing "a chainsaw hunt against public operators."