Skyscrapers coming

last updated 8 January 2015

Paris

The city of Paris will have to lift its ban on high-rise buildings, a deputy mayor said this week. Paris outlawed buildings taller than eight stories in 1974, so the city is remarkably free of ugly, utilitarian architecture. But the ban, coupled with strictly defined city boundaries, means that there just isn’t enough housing for a growing population. Jean-Pierre Caffet, the deputy mayor in charge of urban planning, told the daily Le Parisien that he is considering adding a few high-rise apartment buildings. “We’re not talking about creating Manhattan in Paris,” Caffet said. “But on the other hand, the city cannot become a museum.”