DIJON: “City policy works! declared Minister Olivier Klein
“Working-class neighborhoods are the example of what tomorrow’s public policy will be,” said the Minister for Towns and Housing after having visited, this Thursday, September 8, the Grésilles and Fontaine d’Ouche districts in being welcomed by the mayor of Dijon François Rebsamen.
No announcement but observation. This Thursday, September 8, 2022, Olivier Klein, current Minister Delegate for the City and Housing and former President of the National Agency for Urban Renewal, came to Dijon to realize the effects of the operations to transform the working-class districts of Grésilles and from the Fountain of Ouche.
The official visit was also intended to be political in support of the action of the mayor of Dijon. François Rebsamen (PS, FP) is close to Olivier Klein. Mayor of Clichy-sous-Bois (Seine-Saint-Denis), Olivier Klein left the Socialist Party to join the Progressive Federation founded by François Rebsamen in order to support the re-election of Emmanuel Macron.
Les Grésilles, “one of the beautiful districts of the city”
After a first sequence in Chenôve, the delegation joined the Grésilles district at the end of the morning. “The ANRU’s aid has made it possible to completely redo this district to make it one of the city’s beautiful districts”, declared François Rebsamen welcoming Olivier Klein.
Since the start of urban renewal, the equivalent of 1,000 dwellings have been demolished and the Boutaric building of 240 dwellings remains to be demolished.
A detour to see the small houses opposite the Champollion media library and then an exchange with the team from the Le Mag supermarket – which opened last March – led to a shift in the program, which led to the delegation on the place Galilée when most traders had already folded the stand. The exchanges were reduced to a minimum for the duration of an olive tasting.
La Fontaine d’Ouche, laureate of ANRU’s Fertile Districts
The heart of the ministerial trip was in fact at the beginning of the afternoon, at the extension of the Maison-phare for a real time of exchange with the public actors and associations accompanying the urban renewal of the district of the Fontaine d’ Ouch.
In particular, Olivier Klein carefully followed the presentation of the “Fertile Neighborhoods” project, which aims to develop market gardening in this working-class neighborhood, in response to a call for projects from the ANRU.
The City of Dijon intends to set up an “urban farm” on the site of the demolished buildings at 32-42, avenue du Lac.
The Minister made a stop at this place, on the other side of the track, at numbers 21 and 23, the first deputy mayor of Dijon Nathalie Koenders (PS) also mentioned the security problems, in connection with the traffic of narcotics, are confronted with the inhabitants of a private building.
Experimentation of the European RESPONSE to the energy challenge
After a journey in the Divia City electric shuttles, discussions continued at the Buffon school around the physical and virtual models of the European RESPONSE project (“integrated Solutions for Positive eNergy and resilient CitiEs”), presented by Jean-Patrick Masson (ecologist independent).
The aim is to make an urban block of 615 housing units a positive energy sector thanks to the production of electricity from the Buffon school’s solar panels and connection to the heating network. Everything is controlled by an innovative system to synchronize energy production and consumption as much as possible.
“We can see how much these neighborhoods have been transformed”
“City policy, urban renewal, support for associations, it works! declared Olivier Klein at the end of his official visit. “We see how much these neighborhoods have been transformed from an urban point of view, from the point of view of the feelings of the people we met, the traders, the people who distributed their shopping at the market.”
“It works because we change people’s daily lives, because here we show that we can bring innovation. We know that in these neighborhoods there are a lot of expectations, hopes but also a real need to be demonstration neighborhoods, fertile neighborhoods, here a particularly innovative project in terms of energy”, asked the minister.
“Working-class neighborhoods are the example of what tomorrow’s public policy will be (…) despite the difficulties that I do not deny, we talked about unemployment, security, I also see all the assets and the support that the Ministry of Appropriate city to bring to all these neighborhoods, ”added the minister.
According to the Ministry of the City, since its creation in 2004, the ANRU has paid 102 million euros in subsidies for urban renovation works in Dijon.
Jean-Christophe Tardivon