Place Cockerill should not remain the car park it is today. “We want to give it the appearance of a square in the heart of the city. The objective is to eliminate surface parking and find other parking solutions that will also be available on the outskirts of the city.” The alderman cites here the relay car parks built and to be built and which the tram and high-level service buses will make it possible to reach.
Eventually, the Quai-sur-Meuse car park will also be removed. What will the place that is historically the first port of Liège look like? This question will only be answered when the size and exact location of the new footbridge which will replace the current Saucy footbridge will be known.
The Poor Clares-Carmes axis
The rue des Clarisses and the rue des Carmes which extend it appear in green on the PEP’s map. “It is part of the reflection” confirms the alderman who is considering a single-storey coating, but not to completely exclude cars. “You have to be able to get out of a neighborhood pocket and there is a big school there” where it will still be necessary to be able to drop off the pupils.
Little by little, the car goes away
The City of Liège is busy planning a policy in its historic center which resembles the exact opposite of that which it pursued between the 1950s and 1980s when it came to adapting Liège to the automobile . It was at this time that the quays of the Meuse and the Derivation became expressways, that old districts were pierced and for some razed (Hocheporte, Saint-Lambert, Vertbois-Chiroux).
“We will operate in a different way” explains the alderman of works. As far as parking is concerned, there will be fewer places on the surface and “those that will remain in the city center will be mainly dedicated to local residents. Just because we live in the center does not mean that we do not need a car to get to work or to school”.
Consult the locals
The City intends to ask the opinion of its inhabitants. There will be an online survey in which local residents will be able to say what they want to see changed and what they want to keep. There will be stands for citizens to discuss about the project. The City has even hired a “collective intelligence specialist” to support the process! The people of Liège will also be able to give their opinion on the project by the legal and usual procedure of the public inquiry.
The organization of the work sites depends on the tram work site. The objective confirms Roland Léonard, is to complete the transformations of the places Cathédrale, Saint-Paul and Xavier Neujean at the end of 2026.
Mayor Demeyer and Alderman Léonard specify that the sketches of the Baumans Deffet office which appear in the file which enabled them to obtain the contract and which we show you in this article are not final, nor at this stage approved by the Town Council. They give an idea of what is being prepared without necessarily representing what will actually be achieved. “These are the assumptions of the project authors, made according to what the City intends to implement.” The estimated total budget for the Saint-Paul, Cathedral and Xavier Neujean squares is 7 million euros.