Socio-Spatial Mutations in a former Michelin Housing Development (La Plaine of Clermont-Ferrand)
In the past 20 years, the Michelin housing development, located in La Plaine, North district of Clermont-Ferrand’s city centre, has undergone socio-spatial mutations, no doubt along the same lines of those experienced by other working-class districts. However, these developments are subject to different conditions, time-frames, actors and effects depending on the districts and their context. It seems significant to identify the parameters specific to the socio-spatial recomposition at work in the Michelin working-class district; however, these parameters can be generalized but only in districts sharing the same conditions. The particular aim of this paper is to examine the emphasis placed on the dichotomy between the social and spatial mutations of the area analysized. Bearing this in mind, our reflexions will focus on and highlight the simultaneity of several dynamic processes, in which physical and social changes interact, signalling the transition from a single pronounced working-class identity to a diversity of identities and trajectories. The first process combines the effects of initiatives on the urban level taken by the municipality and Michelin as well as those connected to the development’s proximity to the city centre and the type of habitat. The second analyzes the self-rehabilitation process initiated by both working-class households who have climbed the social ladder and new arrivals from intermediary categories. The third and final process explains the district’s new social construct.