Planning+Factors

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In the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, design for the city of Paris was due for a makeover. Just in time, a period of cultural progression, known as the Renaissance, swept over the country. Beginning with the reign of Henry IV in 1589, changes in urban planning made a tremendous impact on remodeling the city. As one French intellectual of the time, Cret, refers to his vision, "an undertaking such as this had not been attempted since the days of imperial Rome." Henry IV created laws regulating the heights of buildings, and also disallowed overhanging upper stories that were seen in the middle ages. Furthermore, in 1607 Paris was brought under a strict mandate to widen the current street system, known as "La Grande Voirie." Henry IV also began the process of building beautiful town squares and administrative headquarters such as the Place des Vosges and Place Dauphine, respectively. After Henry IV's reign, Louis XIII further secured the fortifications of Paris, eventually forming the Champs Elysees, the main avenue of the capital and one of the most famous in the world. Sparked by the ingenuity of their predecessors, future rulers such as Louis XIV continued plans for the city by constructing magnificent gardens, parks, and boulevards encompassing the city, as well as the great palaces of Versailles slightly west of Paris. These leaders clearly were pioneers in urban planning making Paris one of the most highly visited and efficient cities today. =====  Below is a clip of modern Paris from the Eiffel Tower, its infrastructure clearly a result of the urban planners of the French Renaissance:

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