Escaping the doo-doo

I just spent a few days in our luxurious second residence, the apartment we keep in Villeurbanne. I say luxurious because it's a brand spankin' new T3 ie. two bedroom, that costs us a small fortune to rent each month. It's probably a little too luxurious for what we get out of it, which isn't much considering I'm often in Fountaintown and Seb always gets home late when he's there. So anyway, last month we decided we're giving it all up for a smaller, more affordable place. We gave our notice to the agency and have already started looking around. It isn't just the matter of pricey digs either. We're ditching Villeurbanne for other reasons too. We simply don't feel good there. It's not that we don't like Villeurbanne per sé, ... well okay, actually I guess it is that we don't like Villeurbanne, ...very much at all ...and we're kind of eager to escape it and all its doggie poop.

Goodbye fair suburb tucked away in eastern Lyon, I'm sorry to say that you shall not be missed!

I'm not exactly sure where we'll end up renting next but the thought of going into the centre ville and living in decidedly less mètres carrés has been floating around in our heads. My explorations around there lately have left me feeling like it could be a whole other experience living in the city's center, a good one! And hey it wouldn't be forever because Seb'sjob will eventually change so why not give it a go. Besides Seb and I both really enjoy the idea of living right in the middle of all that Lyonnaisse eye candy. I feel like our part of Lyon, the haven of high rise apartments, is really putting a damper on our outlook about being there. In fact our original plan was to rent in the city center, but the agent who was handling our immoblier dossier through Seb's company kept showing us apartments in Villeurbanne and telling us that centre ville was horrid because of the noise and lack of parking. Well I guess horrid is a relative term so maybe from her perspective it is horrid, but from ours it's quite the opposite and we find Villeurbanne rather horrid.

I've taken a lot of photos in Villeurbanne and I decided to make a little collage of the good and the bad of it. I'll admit that finding the good parts was tough, but I feel I owe it to the city to present both sides. There is some charm and there does seem to be some beautiful, stately homes in this part of Lyon. I kind of feel like Villeurbanne and Bron were the sort of poshy middle class suburbs of the city at the turn of the century. The few homes still standing are beautiful art deco style houses with a grand, little set of iron gates at the entry (see pics). Unfortunately most all of them are being torn down one right after the other to make way for progress. It's alarming how much deconstruction is going on in this area to find space for new apartment projects like those we're renting now, zero charm but lots of modern conveniences. This is why I dislike Villeurbanne the most. The city doesn't seem like it's even remotely interested in preserving the little bit of patrimoine it has and it's lack of this is the number one reason we won't be sticking around. I think this is unfortunate because I feel like they have a lot to work with if only they would stop building crap, oh and clean up more of the crap. I have never stepped in so much dog shit in my life!

So here are Villeurbanne's respective beauty and the beast collections.

click on the grids for a closer look