Converging lines, dissecting circles: railways and the socialist ideal in London and Paris at the turn of the twentieth century

Abstract

Throughout the nineteenth century, railways in London and Paris were
presented as instruments of urban change and social reform in line with
the coincidences as well as the discrepancies between the interests of
railway companies, on the one hand, and those of the municipal and local
authorities of the two cities, on the other. In the process, the connections
between densely built central and inner districts, constantly growing
suburbs and the provision of a$ordable and rapid means of transport were
redefined according to whose interests were at stake. The conception of an
orchestrated railway development for the two cities involved formulating a
co-ordinated plan which was necessarily subject to the conditions imposed
by the inertia of administrative and business practices as well as the weight
of the institutions which decided on the extent and type of what could be
implemented.
In this chapter, I will look at the extent to which the railway plans
produced in London and Paris towards the end of the nineteenth century
were both a result and a constitutive part of the process of how the question
of the public benefit was understood in the two cities. I will discuss the
ideas behind one of the latest plans for the Métropolitain in Paris, before
its construction at the turn of the twentieth century, and their relation to
the municipal authorities’ struggle for legitimacy. I will contrast these with
the attempts to reorganize railway provision in London according to a coordinated
vision and the common effort of the central authorities, a view
put forward by figures such as Charles Booth.