In Paris, pro-grids at Square du Bataclan prevent their dismantling

Around 8:00 a.m., AFP noted, around thirty people, mostly retirees, gathered in front of May-Picqueray square to prevent workers from cutting out the 1990s gates which enclose this green space.

Located above the canal, covered by a median since the 13th century, the latter houses the stele in tribute to the victims of the attack of November 2015, XNUMX at the Bataclan, located just opposite.

The town hall intends to redevelop the median, an axis almost 2 km long, in order to "find a pedestrian promenade along the entire length of the Saint-Martin canal", she told AFP.

The removal of the gates aims to "remove the obstacles which today hinder continuity" between the four squares of these boulevards Jules-Ferry and Richard-Lenoir, and to widen the existing hedges, the town hall further indicates.

But opponents of the project, grouped within the "Sauvons Jules et Richard" association, fear in particular that the opening of the squares will encourage "use conflicts", including "picnics and drinking parties at any time of day and night.

“In Paris, a super dense city, the square is a very good invention,” argues, among the opponents, the architect David Mangin, who participated in the creation of the site in the early 1990s.

For Bernard Laudau, former deputy director of the town planning department at City Hall, Mayor Anne Hidalgo's team is showing "dogmatism" to impose its enlarged promenade which will be "very difficult to maintain".

The FNE Paris association, represented by its co-president Yves Contassot, former environmentalist deputy of ex-mayor PS Bertrand Delanoë, says it has initiated two summary proceedings to prevent the work.

PS Mayor Anne Hidalgo, who wants to open several squares in the capital, has already encountered similar controversy in 2023 with the gates of the one adjoining Notre-Dame Cathedral. They will ultimately be maintained, but perhaps moved.