Vaulx-en-Velin
With a population of some 40,000 inhabitants, the commune of Vaulx-en-Velin is one of the largest municipalities in the Greater Lyon conurbation. At the beginning of the 20th century, the village of Vaulx-en-Velin had a population of around 1,200 mostly working in agriculture, and it remained a small agricultural community well into the 1960s. However, with the expansion of Lyon mainly due to migration, the population of Vaulx-en-Velin grew rapidly from the 1960s. The city was designated at the ministerial level as a « Priority Zone for Urban Expansion » (Zone à Urbaniser en Priorité – ZUP) in 1963, and was the focus of a national housing-building programme from the early 1970s, with the construction of large social housing estates (grands ensembles), a shopping centre, schools, administrative buildings and three industrial estates. |
The « Grand Projet de Ville » national regeneration policy is an area-based initiative to regenerate deprived urban areas. The GPV takes an explicitly integrated approach to regeneration (place-based as well as people-based), involving significant demolition of outdated housing and facilities, and rebuilding of neighbourhoods. The Vaulx-en-Velin GPV covers much of the area that was previously classified as a ZUP. It aims to demolish sub-standard housing stock, rebuild new mixed housing areas, as well as provide new services (rebuilding the town centre, schools and shopping centres), addressing issues such as social inclusion and sustainable development.