LYCOS RETRIEVER 
Baron Haussmann: Napoleon Iii
built 628 days ago
When Baron Haussmann renovated Paris for Napoleon III beginning in 1853, he used zinc extensively, and the beautiful rooftops of today’s Paris are still over 80 percent zinc. Now architects are turning to this long-used traditional material for reasons far beyond its storied past. Unbeknownst to the Baron, zinc has chemical and physical properties which make it one of the most environmentally benign building materials available, virtually 100 percent recyclable and ecologically friendly at every step in its life cycle.
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During the reign of Napoleon III, Baron Haussmann constructed many of the city's present wide avenues, providing great vistas that showcase the cities many attractions, such as the Arc de Triomphe and the Eiffel Tower. As you explore Paris, you'll see that most of these avenues-such as the famed Champs-Élysées-are lined with trees, fountains, and gardens to enjoy.
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Baron Georges-Eugène Haussmann was hired by Napoleon III on 22 June 1852 to "modernize" Paris. He hoped in hiring Haussmann that Paris could be moulded into a city with safer streets, better housing, more sanitary, hospitable, shopper-friendly communities, better traffic flow, and, last but not least, streets too broad for rebels to build barricades across them and where coherent battalions and artillery could circulate easily if need be. He created broad avenues linked to the main train-stations so army troops from the provinces could be operative in a short amount of time (for example, the boulevard de Strasbourg near Gare de l'Est and Gare du Nord). This work achieved during the Second Empire is one of the causes of the quick repression of the 1871 Paris Commune: since the 1848 revolution, Adolphe Thiers had become obsessed with crushing out the next previsible Parisian rebellion. Thus, he planned to leave the city and retreat, in order to better take it back with more military forces.
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Few town planners anywhere in the world have had as great an impact on the city of their birth as Baron Georges-Eugène Haussmann (1809-91) had on Paris. As prefect of the Seine département under Napoleon III for 17 years, Haussman and his staff of architects and engineers completely rebuilt huge swathes of Paris. He is best known - and most bitterly attacked - for having demolished much of medieval Paris, replacing the chaotic narrow streets, which were easy to barricade in an uprising, with the handsome, arrow-straight thoroughfares for which the city is so famous. He ... revolutionised Paris' water supply and sewerage systems and laid out many of the city's loveliest parks, including large areas of the Bois de Boulogne, 16e, and the Bois de Vincennes, 12e.
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Baron Georges Eugene Haussmann (1809-1892) was appointed by Napoleon III on June 22, 1853 to "modernize" Paris. In this way, Napoleon III hoped to better control the flow of traffic, encourage economic growth, and make the city "revolution-proof" by making it harder to build barricades. Haussmann accomplished all this by tearing up many of the old, twisting streets and dilapidated apartment houses, and replacing them with the wide, tree-lined boulevards and expansive gardens which Paris is famous for today.
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In 1858, Napoleon III decided to build the Grand Opera, for which Paris had long been awaiting, in the new business quarter designed by Baron Haussmann. The previous halls, since the foundation of the Académie Royale de Music, founded in 1669 by Louis XIV, had been either of temporary construction or had been destroyed by fires.
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