Nancy, Place de la Carrière

This is technically a square, not a boulevard - it is too short to be a true boulevard. Nevertheless, it has all of the other attributes of a boulevard and deserves study as such.

One very distinctive trait is the row of nearly identical buildings on the far side of the street. I know from personal observation that this is also substantially the case on the other side of the street, although it is difficult to see in this photograph.

Unlike a true boulevard, the view is closed off at the far end (and the near end as well). This gives the space a very comfortable sense of enclosure. The central paved area, which is normally a roadway, is in this case reserved for pedestrians. Again, the problem arises of too much sidewalk area - there will rarely be enough pedestrians to really populate the available space sufficiently to make it lively. That may, actually, have been deliberate - this was clearly once a residential area, and the open space may have served more as a park than as a square.

Today, both side streets sport rows of parked cars on each side, which hugely detracts from the attractiveness of this once lovely space.

 
Please Wait
Next
City Design Home

E-mail
Carfree.com
Text ©2001-2002 J.Crawford