Macron plans to rebuild ‘ugly France’

The French government has announced a plan to improve “commercial wastelands” across the country. President Emmanuel Macron has allocated €24m to the plan, which aims to improve the appeal of some of the 1,500 shopping parks – with sprawling car parks and large chain stores often housed in windowless, prefabricated buildings from the 1970s. Notoriously lengthy planning processes are to be streamlined to facilitate the makeover of ugly shopping centres, with mayors will be given more power to initiate the replanning or rebuilding of shopping areas or their conversion into housing or green spaces. However, the budget for the makeover plan has ben criticised for being far too small to rebuild or repurpose unsightly zones commerciales. Across the country, they occupy an area equivalent to five times that of central Paris. The plan as outlined remains vague, but the government said its main aim is to nudge local authorities and private enterprise into action and to remove bureaucratic obstacles to reconstruction. The Times (£)