À Bordeaux Saint-Jean, l’aménageur Euratlantique face à la colère des habitants de l’îlot Amédée
At the beginning of this month of March, the developer Euratlantique had opened a consultation on a revised and corrected version of the same project. This is the restitution of this consultation which took place this Thursday. It’s an understatement to say that the rejection that was revealed at the beginning of the month only got worse. Especially since in the meantime, the inhabitants of an ICF residence (SNCF real estate company) have discovered that their building was going to be razed.
Palpable hostility
In its new version, the Amédée block (named after rue Amédée-Saint-Germain) loses 7,000 m² (from 51,000 to 44,000 m²) and gains a green space of 1.2 hectares. The profile of the buildings has been revised to place the highest ones against the railway tracks, far from the shops which are on the other side of the street.
At the start of the meeting, the hostility is palpable. The residents had prepared their coup. From the first minutes, they brandish signs denouncing the concretization of this narrow island, wedged between the railway line and the straight street. “Concrete = prison”, “No to concrete”, “Neighborhood to live in or neighborhood to sell? », « Densify = suffocate »… Some showed at arm’s length simple drawings of trees.
Little room for maneuver
“I note a form of creativity”, smiles Valérie Lasek, general manager of Euratlantique, without managing to relax the atmosphere. This project was acted under the old majority, the current one inherits it. Pierre Hurmic tried to redirect it, but he knows that “the margins do not maneuver are very narrow”.
“What is the use of this consultation, if the room for maneuver is so small, to choose a scale or a pétanque court? »
During the first consultation meeting, the 1uh March, he urged participants to make their voices heard. This Thursday, they got loose. “We are surprised to learn from the press that the building we have lived in, some for a long time, where others have raised their children, is going to be destroyed, explains a man. We were treated with contempt. We underwent months of work, no one came to ask us what we wanted. What violence! General Manager of ICF Atlantique, Annick Izier is accused of having concealed the destruction project. She affirms that it was mentioned in certain documents, that the inhabitants could not see it. The public chokes: “Lie by omission! “We didn’t know how to read the plans, or else we saw but didn’t understand anything! quipped a man.
battle of numbers
The case is complicated. In place of this residence, it is planned to build 130 social housing units. The city in need. She then tries to reassure: “There are avenues to study, things are not closed, we have time ahead of us…” Disbelief of the audience. Valérie Lasek also tried to calm the audience: “We probably didn’t meet you often enough. »
The debate turns to a general criticism of densification. We throw figures, ratios of square meters of green space per inhabitant, numbers of dwellings. “On a green town hall, I voted for it, I would like to hear it, launches a young woman. It’s not an ecological project, we question what was decided before it, we have to review the copy. Another asks “what is the use of this consultation, if the leeway is so small, to choose a scale or a petanque court? Anger, consternation, feeling that everything is tied up in advance.
Valérie Lasek recalls that Euratlantique must reconcile multiple constraints, including that of building housing, offices and shops, in a district to be revitalised. And, in the end, the development operation must balance itself financially. The final word is given by Pierre Hurmic: “Obviously, the project arouses strong reactions, he acknowledges. Euratlantique is a state operation that has been heavily concreted, a dated project, with a delusion of grandeur. Tonight, there is no consensus. We cannot conclude this consultation. New avenues of development will have to be studied. His position as President of Euratlantique will be very useful to him.