Noailles and Cours Julien: The Port-City France Hasn't Decided About
Two square kilometres in the first and sixth arrondissements of Marseille. Seven stops. The daily market that is the social and spatial heart of post-colonial Marseille. The memorial site of a building collapse that killed eight residents on the morning of the fifth of November, two thousand and eighteen. Nineteenth-century tenement stock that still houses the inner-city immigrant working class. A Comorian community marker. A Wenzhou Chinese commercial edge. The gentrification frontier on the Cours Julien plateau. A contested public square at the end. The Republic has built this neighbourhood twice and displaced its working population both times.
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Marché des Capucins: The Social Heart of Post-Colonial Marseille
Marché des Capucins: The Social Heart of Post-Colonial Marseille
Place du Marché-des-Capucins, first arrondissement. The daily produce market of Noailles. Site of the sixteen sixty-five Capuchin friars' convent on land purchased earlier by Catherine de Medici. Convent nationalized in seventeen ninety-one; the current formal food market dates from nineteen fifty-six.
Sixty-Three and Sixty-Five Rue d'Aubagne: The Memorial
The site of the fifth of November, two thousand and eighteen, building collapse. Two contiguous residential buildings at numbers sixty-three and sixty-five collapsed on the morning of the collapse; eight residents died. Number sixty-seven was demolished after the collapse as a precaution. Memorial wall at the corner.
Rue Longue des Capucins: The Housing Stock That Failed
Nineteenth-century vernacular tenement stock of central Marseille, between the Canebière and the Préfecture. Five and six storey buildings, small windows, narrow co-ownerships, the same vernacular block stock that failed catastrophically two streets east in twenty eighteen.
Comorian Marseille: The Largest Diaspora Outside the Archipelago
Comorian community marker on the Noailles streetscape, on the eastern side of the Marché des Capucins. Streetscape-level anchor for the largest Comorian diaspora outside the Comoros archipelago. Migration began in the late nineteen-forties via Messageries Maritimes sailors. Comoros independence, nineteen seventy-five.
Belsunce Edge: The Wenzhou Commercial Layer
The Belsunce-Noailles boundary edge, northwest of the Marché des Capucins. Wenzhou-origin Chinese settlement in Belsunce from the early two thousands. Distinct from the Paris-Belleville Wenzhou diaspora in scale, period of arrival, and commercial register.
Cours Julien: The Gentrification Frontier
Cours Julien plateau in the sixth arrondissement, east-uphill from Noailles. Site of the eighteen sixty wholesale Marché Central until its relocation in nineteen seventy-three. Artist and bookseller settlement of the vacant commercial spaces from the early nineteen-eighties. Post twenty ten creative-class gentrification frontier.
Place Jean Jaurès, La Plaine: The Republic Has Built This Neighbourhood Twice
Place Jean Jaurès, locally known as La Plaine. Sits between Noailles, downhill to the west, and Cours Julien, uphill to the north-east. Site of the contested twenty eighteen to twenty twenty municipal redevelopment, read by residents as gentrification-by-public-works.
Best Time to Visit
Late morning to mid-afternoon on a Tuesday through Saturday, when the Marché des Capucins is fully open and the rue d'Aubagne memorial wall is undisturbed by commuter traffic. The market reads most fully between ten and one. The Cours Julien plateau is most legible in the late afternoon, when the cafés and boutiques are open and the foot traffic is moderate. Sundays are quieter at the market and at the Cours Julien; the memorial stop reads equally on a Sunday. The fifth of November anniversary of the twenty eighteen collapse draws annual commemorations on rue d'Aubagne; the tour is walkable that day and respectful behaviour at the memorial is expected.
Pro Tips
- •The audio anchors on the exterior of every stop. You do not need to enter any building, mosque, or restaurant to follow the tour. The Marché des Capucins is open from approximately eight in the morning to seven in the evening, Monday to Saturday, with a shorter Sunday session.
- •Stop two on rue d'Aubagne is the memorial stop and the load-bearing stop of the tour. The audio holds maximum restraint. Behave as you would at any memorial. Quiet voice, no posed photographs, walk on after listening.
- •The walk from the Belsunce edge at stop five up to the Cours Julien plateau at stop six is about four hundred metres of slope. The climb is gradual but continuous. Comfortable shoes recommended.
- •Place Jean Jaurès, locally known as La Plaine, hosts a weekly market on certain days. If you walk on a market day, the synthesis stop reads against the live square. If you walk on a quiet day, the redesigned perimeter and the documentation of the twenty eighteen to twenty twenty redevelopment are more legible.
- •The Marché des Capucins and the Belsunce edge are working markets and working commercial strips for the communities that live and shop there. Photograph buildings, signage, and the streetscape; avoid photographing people, especially in restaurants, cafés, and mosques, without consent.
- •If you only have ninety minutes, walk stops one through four, finish at the Comorian community marker, and return to the Marché des Capucins. The thesis still resolves on the housing stock and the Comorian presence as the Noailles half of the tour. The Cours Julien and La Plaine half can be walked on a second pass.
- •The Vieux-Port is fifteen minutes' walk west of the Marché des Capucins. The Canebière is one block north of the market. Neither is on this tour. Marseille's port and its Belle-Époque architecture are held by two separate Roamer Marseille tours.
Safety & Precautions
- Noailles and Belsunce are working-class neighbourhoods with strong residential and commercial character. The communities the tour observes live and work on the streets the tour walks. Treat the neighbourhood as a neighbourhood, not a backdrop.
- Pickpocketing is documented around the Marché des Capucins and the lower rue de Belsunce, and on the metro lines one and two serving the area. Keep wallets and phones in front pockets or zipped bags, especially in the market crowd.
- The walk is about two kilometres total. The route is mostly flat in Noailles, with a continuous gradual climb from the Belsunce edge at stop five up to the Cours Julien plateau at stop six. Comfortable closed shoes recommended.
- The rue d'Aubagne memorial site at stop two is the most sensitive moment of the tour. Annual commemorations are held on the fifth of November. On other days the memorial is a quiet streetscape feature. Approach it as a memorial in any city.
- Marseille summers run hot, and Noailles has limited shade between stops. Carry water and consider an early-morning or late-afternoon start in July and August.
- The Cours Julien plateau at stop six and Place Jean Jaurès at stop seven host evening nightlife from late afternoon onward. The audio holds equally in the evening, with louder foot traffic. If you prefer a quieter read, walk before three in the afternoon.
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