Contenu du sommaire

Since 1966, the French State has attempted to develop an urban policy according to its own objectives for national territory planning. We now have enough distance to estimate the value of the real results for the Lyons metropolitan area. The numerous planning documents elaborated at different scales have been only partially applied and very formally respected. Beyond the factual distorsions, it is the very nature of urban planning which is now question, in particular its ability to deal with economic and social evolutions and to obtain assent for its objectives from local power and local interests.

The Main Plan for Town Country Planning in the Greater Grenoble Area, passed in 1973, was worked out in days of high growh economy. Despite the economic crisis which the city of Grenoble (as well as other cities) has experienced since 1974, we do not think that the choices made in this plan as regards the use of spaces, should be called in question again. After ten years of putting its principles into effect, it can even considered that the results obtained so far, in spite of the difficulties met, are satisfactory, and tangible aspects of these principles are beginning to appear in the urban-fabric of the Greater Grenoble area.

During the seventies, Saint-Etienne Town and Country Planning Scheme was founded on zoning. It was too ambitious, and the objectives retained were made obsolete by the 1974 crisis. After three hesitant years, a new town council has choosen a new urban policy on well-known Bologna model.

Lyons, a European metropolis ? The level of services and the quality of the environment justify this claim. However, registered offices and international class institutions are still missing in the town. Paris is now the only French town inserted in international systems. This situation is prejudicial to the region and to the country as well.

The whole of commercial structures — internal as well as external — must be adapted to the present requirements of the expanding foreign markets. Many French compagnies will have to modify their commercial structures by creating or strengthening the export departments, which implies that they are bound to reconsider their sales strategy and market network abroad. Further, export aid services must be promoted and improved, so that even small compagnies may assert themselves and take part in international trade. In spite of the sustained efforts of both, manufacturers and Public Powers, the constant deficit of the French trade balance proves that our economic expansion is, as a whole, tied to the level of exports. Now if ever is the time to reinforce the notion of the primacy of the export sector and — consequently consider its reorganization as imperious.

In trying to measure the tourist flows, the monthly statistics of postage rates are still one of the safest means. Applied to the Rhône department, the process permits cartography of the migratory field, which is the best discloser of contrasts appearing in August. They oppose the areas of town people going on holiday to the rural receiving zones, scattered from the Monts du Beaujolais to the Monts du Lyonnais and nearly to the outskirts of towns.

Urban dynamism and the decline of mountain agriculture explain the modest position of agriculture in Rhône-Alpes economy. Beefcattle farming is prevalent except in some areas specialized in wine and fruit production.