[4][5][2][6] This urban centre also provides major entertainment and cultural facilities, including one of the largest urban shopping malls in Europe, 800 shops, Paul Bocuse indoor food market, café terraces, the Auditorium concert hall, Bourse du Travail theatre, Municipal Library, Departmental Archives and Fort Montluc.

The central business district is currently undergoing major renovation and construction works, according to a revitalization project totalling €2.5 billion between public and private investments.

It could either come from the tenacity with which several landlords managed to save pieces of land from Rhône waters or how Guillaume de Fuer named his parcel "Pardeu" by the end of the 12th century.

A last theory states that Marc-Antoine Mazenod gave his 140 hectares land to Hôtel-Dieu Public Hospitals after his daughter was saved miraculously and named it "Gift from God".

However, the process of urbanization was limited by traverse axes and the fact that Lafayette street was the only road connecting La Part-Dieu with Central Lyon.

[10][13][14] At the beginning of the 20th century, Édouard Herriot was elected Mayor of Lyon, a dominating French city outside of Paris, thanks to its dynamic industrial and commercial output.

Inspired by the French hygiéniste urbanist movement, similar to Haussmann's renovation of Paris, he undertook major works to improve urban and social space.

The eastward urban expansion of rail and road networks turned La Part-Dieu marshalling yards into the centre of the metropolitan area.

[10] Following World War II, France's top priorities were to rebuild the housing stock fast, to push for economic development and to favour efficient movements by car.

The fact that large estates were owned by state administrations (Public Hospitals, SNCF and the military), allowed for a profound transformation right in the middle of the city.

The winning architectural project abided by the Athens Charter, a rigorous modernist urban planning philosophy developed by Le Corbusier.

[10] While the Charles de Gaulle government pushed for the decentralization of France, car-centric urbanism from the Trente Glorieuses fuelled peripherical growth at the expense of city centres.

It included the development of commercial, tertiary and cultural activities, to compete with Paris and other international cities and to turn La Part-Dieu into a showcase of modernity.

[10] Lyon had to become the "Balancing Metropolis", relying on regional cities like Grenoble or Saint Etienne, that fought the impoverishment and depopulation of urban centers, owing to a network of highways passing through La Part-Dieu.

The original plan included major east–west and north–south green axes, pedestrian-friendly spaces such as a central plaza well served by public transit, and an iconic tower as tall as the Basilica of Notre-Dame de Fourvière from its historical hill.

[10] However, the 1970s oil shocks and following housing crises altered the project as profitability became the main concern, isolating the district from the rest of city flows.

Half of the marshalling yards were converted into a large real estate project to fund the development of the new train station on each side of the rail tracks.

It also wished to establish a proper European business district doubling its office supply by densifying the area with 7 highrises such as the Swiss Life and Oxygène Tower, although most proposals were scrapped, because Lyon was focusing elsewhere.

[10][2] Other objectives aimed at reintegrating the district within its surrounding urban environment by rethinking major axes, bringing the T1 tramway to life, renovating public spaces, improving connections between the métro and the main train station and demolishing elevated pedestrian footbridges.

La Part-Dieu also offers several plazas (Nelson Mandela, Europe, Du lac, Voltaire and Francfort), several gardens (Jugan, Jacob-Kaplan and Sainte-Marie-Perrin) and a park (Montluc Fort), on top of the centenary plane trees from the former cavalry barracks.

[56][57][58][59] Completed in 1977, this 164 meters tall building was designed by US-based architecture firm Cossutta & Associates for the main structure and by Stéphane du Château for its pyramid crown.

[50][63][64] Originally planned during the 1960s, Part-Dieu railway station only opened in 1983 as part of a high speed rail line project between Lyon and Paris.

48 merchants ( fishmongers, cheesemakers, bakers and pastry cooks, caterers, cellarmen and restaurant owners ) work under the same roof and perpetuate local traditions of Lyon, the gastronomical capital of France.

[69][70] This concrete shell was named after the famed Lyon musician and was drawn by architect Henri Pottier, assistant of urbanist Charles Delfante.

[71][72][73] Bourse du Travail theatre was constructed between 1929 and 1936 in Art Deco style by Charles Meysson, chief architect of Lyon.

The consultation room of this golden-clad secure building currently hosts a large collection of maps, both public administrative and private reserves, notarial archives and documents from the historical library, from the year 861 till today.

Four massive square-shaped pier foundations bear the whole suspended structure, doubling as elevator shafts, and four concrete boxes self intersecting on top of it form a crown.

[80] Montluc Fort was erected in 1831 under Louis-Philippe's reign as part of Lyon's fortified belt, to protect the city from foreign invasions, especially Prussian ones.

The church was originally designed to preach Christian values in an immoral working-class neighbourhood with a high poverty rate and a low number of baptizations.

Better integrated into the urban fabric and transit system, and with a strong focus on designing pleasurable residential and public spaces, the project promotes the contemporary French way of life, on a European level.