Les mutations d'un quartier pauvre à Angers : le quartier Saint-Nicolas dans la Doutre

Abstract

The urban patrimony of Angers was in the 1960's one of the most decayed in France. Consequently the town directed towards operations of renovation (reconstruction) of improvement (rehabilitation) or restoration of the most ruinous districts. Saint-Nicolas was one of them : a real district in the geographic sense of the word with a whole block of houses from the XVth to the XVIIIth century inhabited by a population belonging to the very under priviliged social class. The mutation of the district was long and sometimes painful; it is being ended at the present time. This article analyses the components of the ancient district to show then the difficulties of such operations of urbanism, the different reactions of the population and the sensible alteration of the social space of the town.