[hrktb]

Would it be self-fulfilling if we disagreed on him being controversial ?

Perhaps an aspect of it Parisian's Paris and tourist's Paris is fundamentally different, and the current leadership is more or less trying to undo a lot of what Haussman stood for to make Paris friendlier to live for Parisians. Whole blocks are closed cars to bring back shops and 'village' like environment.

Modern residential neighbourhoods are rebuilt with lacy paths, cul de sacs, pedestrian/car cohabitation, closer concentration of housing.

A lot of what Haussmann did was beneficial from a health perspective, but we know we can solve these issues in other ways, an I don't think most planners would do it the way Haussmann did if they had the choice to go back in time.

[harperlee]

When thinking in historical times you should put yourself in that moment of time. Of course if someone travels back in time with current knowledge will do things in different ways than Haussmann - they know whats going to happen, they know about things Haussmann didn’t.

[hrktb]

It's not just historic fantasy though, there was opposition to his way, but they didn't have the political clout nor could oppose centering the cities around cars.

It's not just Haussmann either, most countries had that tension around letting cars dominate or not (there was an excellent 99pi episode about these tensions [0]), it just happened that one side massively won benefiting from economics, politics and power distribution.

[0] https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/episode-76-the-modern...

[irishsultan]

I think you need better evidence for this tension than an episode that's talking about a different country half a century later (the time difference is especially important, because the changes to Paris took place at a time when cars were still being invented, e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benz_Patent-Motorwagen "widely regarded as the world's first production automobile" was patented in 1885, 15 years after the initial development according to Haussmans plans stopped)

[hrktb]

The opposition was not against the car at that time, but against the military purpose (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georges-Eugène_Haussmann#The_d...), the crushing of the lower layers of society, who had to move away from the renovated areas, and more than anything the amount of money thrown into it that didn't seem to be worth it.

Haussmann succeeded mostly because of the emperor's constant backup and the basically no limit budget he got from him. Once these backings were gone he was out of the game.

He wasn't otherwise very well supported by the people. I kinda like this quote:

> In his memoires, Haussmann had this comment on his dismissal: "In the eyes of the Parisians, who like routine in things but are changeable when it comes to people, I committed two great wrongs; over the course of seventeen years I disturbed their daily habits by turning Paris upside down, and they had to look at the same face of the Prefect in the Hotel de Ville. These were two unforgivable complaints."[17]

[grumpydba]

> Perhaps an aspect of it Parisian's Paris and tourist's Paris is fundamentally different, and the current leadership is more or less trying to undo a lot of what Haussman stood for to make Paris friendlier to live for Parisians. Whole blocks are closed cars to bring back shops and 'village' like environment.

Yes Haussman was definitely wrong when he planned a city for cars. More seriously just check paintings or videos of Paris before the expansion of individual cars. Read books. It was highly walkable.