: Paris Buried a River 100 Years Ago. Now The City Needs To Resurface It to Combat Climate Change #WorldNEWS In 1899, a writer for French newspaper Le Figaro surveyed the damage Parisians had done to

Paris Buried a River 100 Years Ago. Now The City Needs To Resurface It to Combat Climate Change #WorldNEWS
In 1899, a writer for French newspaper Le Figaro surveyed the damage Parisians had done to the Bièvre, a river that for hundreds of years had snaked up through southern Paris, joining the Seine near the Jardin des Plantes. “It flows slowly, oily and black, streaked with acids, dotted with soapy and putrid pustules,” the writer observed. “In the sparse and sordid grass, peeled like the back of a worn-out horse, parasitic plants grow in abundance. ”
The waterway, averaging 13 ft. in width, had featured in Renaissance poetry by François Rabelais and in Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables. But as the Industrial Revolution took off, masses of tanneries, dyers and laundries used and abused the Bièvre’s waters, leaving it resembling an open-air sewer, which authorities decided to pave over. “Tomorrow,” Le Figaro mourned as the 20th century approached, “this once ‘beautiful river’ will be walled up and bewitched like a sorceress during the middle ages, and in this strange and desolate valley … a new district of tall and flaming buildings will rise. ”
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Paris’ last stretch of the Bièvre was sealed up in 1912. Since then, a deep-rooted cultural fascination with the lost river has powered several heritage campaigns to reopen it. But none have succeeded: its waters no longer even run under the city, having been cut off at towns closer to its source, 13 miles southwest of Paris.

Today, though, the Bièvre has an unlikely ally: climate change. The same industrial activity that destroyed the river has helped drive global warming, with Paris’ average temperature already 4. 1°F (2. 3°C) higher than in Rabelais’ day. The urban heat-island effect, in which buildings and paved roads absorb more heat than vegetation and water do, is making matters worse, driving Paris’ temperature up by as much as 14. 4°F (8°C) than nearby rural areas during heatwaves. By the mid-21st century, according to local government estimates, Paris could have a climate resembling the much hotter city of Seville in southern Spain.
“We have to adapt Paris to the future and yet, this is one of the most densely populated cities in the world, and on top of that, it’s a historic city with lots of heritage restrictions, so we are limited in what we can do,” says Dan Lert, Paris’ deputy mayor for climate, water and energy. “La Bièvre is one of the great tools that we have. ”

Sepia Times/Universal Images Group/Getty ImagesThe Bièvre in the 1860s
Living with nature
Bodies of water, just like trees and plants, help to cool down their surrounding areas: water absorbs heat from the air, and when water particles evaporate, they carry the heat away with them, lowering the ground-level temperature.