Gautier experience's

During the summer of 2017, I have had the honour to have a internship with a Lebanon PhD in order to help her with some researches. Her thesis aim to study transformation of agricultural property linked to urban sprawl of Beirut. She focus on seven specific spaces which are distributed on all territory of Beirut. Each space represents a specific model such as private property or religious property.

I realized my internship through a mission for National Centre of Scientific Research. All during my summer, I was accommodated by French Institute of Middle-Orient and used these locals such as office or library. Until my return to Grenoble, I had the honour to discuss with professors of this Institute who shared with me their experiences being senior researchers. In this way, my internship was not only a work but also a life experience. For example, after a dinner, a professor of history narrated me the great story of Ottoman nation.

The subject of my internship was divided in two parts. The first part was to create 11 maps about each territory and the second was to suggest a point of view on suburb of Beirut.

In the first part, I should make some maps which was splitted in three categories. The first category is a map which give a point of view on general location on all maps. Then, three maps suggest a historical observation on 3 priority territories. Finally, the seven other maps are focus on contemporary time. Except the first map, all others should show land use such as natural, agricultural, urban and wilderness. They are been built by using Qgis software. Majority data was created while someone was found on websites.

In the second part of my internship, I tried to understand how Beirut suburban functions. I did many plans by using my maps, took lot of pictures during field work and discussed with my tutor and teachers to suggest them my point of view. Which all those data, I have built my opinion in using a process. At the beginning, I analysed my maps and my plans to find a common points between all spaces. Then, those spaces are described as a common space called « suburban of Beirut ». To conclude, a final interpretation suggests an evolution of properties to agricultural till urban in « suburban of Beirut » ; this suggestion is based on criteria to explain that some spaces are more resilient than others.

Beyond my work, this summer in Beirut was a valuable life experience because I’ve could discover an other cultural. My trips for my work or my weekend were an opportunity to get new pictures for my book. Indeed, Lebanon cities are different than French cities. Many old places are opened such as Tyr or Byblos. Those cities are built by an ancient civilisation which calls « Phoenicians ». Plus, the news urban spaces produce a big metropolitan space which might be named as « Grand Beirut». It doesn’t exit officials rules to control this urban sprawl within institutional boundaries because real estate agents and public actor contribute together to intensify metropolitan area construction of Beirut all from the sea to mountain. I tried to take pictures showing all these point of views.

Finally, it’s so important to discover new urban territories to have a better overview about our work as urban planner. Indeed, when you can understand the way of function an unknow town, you can have a better analyse for your own town in our daily life.

Gautier Hunout – Student of Urban Planning and International Cooperation.