The current situation in France

[velcorin]

The difference is that in other European cities the rich areas are within touching distance with the poor areas. They share common transport links, facilities, and access to jobs. Satellite cites like Clichy-sur-Bois is 10-12km out, no railway station, no buses, no police station, no Jobcentre. It's a dumping ground. Out of sight, out mind, until it explodes.

[Judith]

[quote user="woolybanana"]

Segregation exists already in the big cities; how many poor live in Chelsea, for example?

[/quote]

And also in Westminster - it has a large population of poorer people cheek-by-jowl with the rich.

But I take Velcorin's point - in larger towns and cities in France there do seem to be more areas with HLM's completely separated from the better class areas. 

[woolybanana]

Those were designed mainly for brown people weren't they?

[5-element]

Not always. The area of "La Paillade" in Montpellier was built and designed specifically for "Pieds Noirs" who were repatriated from Algeria after 1962. Now the Pieds Noirs have gone further afield, and it is now a well-known hot spot. Flats are much cheaper there than anywhere else around Montpellier, and full of people "issus de l'immigration".