Square du Docteur-Grancher

The ground beneath your feet holds a hidden history of collapse and transformation. Before this square became a green space in two thousand six, the land was occupied by a dense urban cluster of three narrow streets, including the rue de la Voulzie and the rue Westermann. These buildings were eventually demolished because the unstable soil—riddled with gypsum and weakened by the nearby tunnel of the Charonne railway—made the area uninhabitable. Engineers stabilized the ground with injections of concrete to create the elevated, sloping gardens you see today.