Instead of submitting to top-down ideas, maybe it’s time for the people of Melbourne to let their green thumbs go wild. The street I’m currently living on in Marseille, France, is the width of a car. I know this because the last time someone drove down it, no one could get in or out until the car slowly backed out again.
On either side of the narrow road, old, once-elegant apartment blocks – four stories high and three windows wide – are hung with faded shutters. They give the residents a facade of privacy. Open them, and I know what my neighbour is watching on TV, what they’re having for dinner, and the colour of their pyjamas.
This is the kind of high-density living we’ve yet to truly embrace in Melbourne, but I’m loving it. Greenery now fills the streets in the district of Le Panier in Marseille, France, as part of their Visa vert (Green Visa) program. Credit: Marseille Tourism My skinny street might be narrow, dusty, and in need of a good makeover, but it does have one redeeming feature.
Outside every building is a random collection of sturdy containers – bins, buckets, troughs and pots – all filled with plants, some tall enough to reach the second floor. And even though the street often smells like urine, and every morning there are beer bottles strewn along it, the plants are thriving, a green wall that adds privacy, beauty and shade. As a result of a project called the Visa vert (Green Visa), implemented by the City of Marseille in 2015, streets like .
