Dirty boulevard: why Paris's ring road is a major block on the city's grand plans | Cit... - 0 views
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[pop-up] urbain on 01 Jul 15"With 1.1m cars a day, the 35 kilometres of the Boulevard Périphérique are the busiest in Europe. Paris's inner ring road runs around the French capital, following the city's administrative boundaries almost perfectly and connecting the city proper and its banlieues, or suburbs. Since its inauguration in 1973, the périphérique - measuring 40 to 60 metres wide and composed of up to six lanes - has been a concrete belt around Paris, making all too real what should have remained an invisible administrative boundary. This has reinforced the insurmountable contrast between Paris and the city's adjacent municipalities, adding a physical dimension to political borders and separating the Parisiens from the rest of France."