Épinal is a French commune located in the Vosges department, in
the Grand Est region. Prefecture, it is located in the south of the
historical and cultural region of Lorraine. Épinal is crossed by the
Moselle, a tributary of the Rhine.
In the 2017 census, the
intramural municipality (without its suburb) had 31,740 inhabitants.
In 2015, Epinal's urban area had 93,184 inhabitants and 59,586 jobs
in 2017 in its employment area. It is, by far, the first town in the
Vosges, and the fourth in Lorraine, behind Metz, Nancy and
Thionville.
Basilica of Saint-Maurice d'Épinal
The Basilica of
Saint-Maurice d'Épinal is a religious building built, for its
current state, between the eleventh century and the thirteenth
century, it depends on the diocese of Saint-Dié. In the Middle Ages,
the land depended on the Lord of Metz; for the religious, they
depended on the diocese of Toul, parish of Dogneville. The basilica
is probably located on the site of the first church in the city,
built in the tenth century by Bishop Gérard de Toul at the request
of Thierry de Hamelant, Bishop of Metz; the parish is made up of
five manses taken from the parish of Dogneville: Spinal, Grennevo,
Avrinsart, Villers and Rualménil3. Thierry de Hamelant, founding the
monastery, the church welcomed both the population of the city and
the Benedictine monks, was initially dedicated to Saint Maurice. To
complete the foundation, the two bishops moved, Thierry de Hamelant
bringing the relics of Saint Goëry, a miracle would have taken place
on this occasion reported by Widric4. South of the nave was the
cloister. To the south of the choir was associated the first
Spinalian cemetery, on the current Place de l'Atre, as recalled by a
crucifix applied to the wall of the south arm of the transept. The
next bishop, Adalbéron II, finding the monastery deserted, decided
to install Benedictine nuns there under the patronage of Saint
Goëry, one of his predecessors at the cathedral of Metz.
In
the middle of the eleventh century, a new Romanesque church was
rebuilt and consecrated by the Lorraine pope Leo IX. It is assumed
that it looked comparable to today. The walls of the nave are still
those of the eleventh century to which aisles were added in the
thirteenth century. The traces of the original openings are clearly
visible on the outside, on the south wall.
It is probably
during the 13th century that the nuns are replaced by a chapter of
canonesses which will last until the end of the 18th century. Again
consecrated to Saint-Maurice, the collegiate church also served as a
parish church for the inhabitants of Épinal, an altar having been
placed for this purpose at the eastern end of the nave.
Work
took place from the thirteenth century to the fourteenth century.
From the thirteenth century, the choir was rebuilt, a new portal
opening onto the city was built in the north wall of the nave and
the latter was covered with vaults.
In 1846, the church was
classified as a historical monument. In the 19th century, the belfry
tower was opened with a neo-Romanesque portal.
It was on
February 20, 1933 that the parish church of Saint-Maurice was
consecrated as a minor basilica, under the pontificate of Pius XI.
Important restorations took place in the twentieth century. A
parasol with a red and gold band, an escutcheon and a bell, in the
choir, recall this title.
In the south of Lorraine, close to Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany and
Switzerland, Épinal enjoys a privileged location in the heart of Europe,
on the borders of the Blue Banana.
Épinal is located 320 km east
of Paris, 107 km southwest of Strasbourg (the regional capital), 70 km
south of Nancy and 81 km northwest of Mulhouse.
Épinal is crossed
by the Moselle. The city is located in a corridor dug by the latter in
the layers of Vosges sandstone resting on the granite bedrock of the
Vosges massif. The light porphyroid granite outcrops at the bottom of
the Moselle valley. The width of the valley is about 750 m.
The
city is surrounded by more or less rounded plateaus with a relatively
marked slope, especially on the right bank. The slope is sometimes
indented by secondary valleys such as the rue Saint-Michel and the
faubourg d'ambrail to the north. The altitude at the level of the
Moselle in the center of the city is 324 m. In the west (left bank), the
plateaus rise to an altitude of 360 to 440 m and for the east (right
bank), they reach an altitude of 360 to 470 m. The Moselle valley widens
rapidly downstream of the city.
The setting is green, the
coniferous and beech forests of the plateaus are visible from the city
center.
The neighboring municipalities are Golbey, Hadol, Jeuxey, Renauvoid, Uriménil, Arches, Archettes, Aydoilles, La Baffe, Chantraine, Deyvillers, Dinozé, Dogneville and Dounoux.
Épinal has a minimum altitude of 315 m and a maximum of 492 m; its
average altitude is 404 m while that of its town hall is 330 m.
The west of the department and its sedimentary rocks composing the
Lorraine Plateau, contrast with the old base of crystalline and
sandstone rocks on which the Vosges mountain rests to the East; this
causes a multitude of landscapes and reliefs.
Hydrogeology and
climatology: Information system for the management of groundwater in the
Rhine-Meuse basin :
Communal territory: Land use (Corinne Land
Cover); Watercourses (BD Carthage),
Geology: Geological map;
Geological and technical sections,
Hydrogeology: Groundwater bodies;
Lisa comics; Piezometric maps.
The municipality is located partly in the Rhine watershed within the
Rhine-Meuse basin and partly in the Saône watershed within the
Rhône-Mediterranean-Corsica basin. It is drained by the Moselle, the
supply channel of the Bouzey reservoir, the Saint-Oger stream, the
Etrangleux stream, the Bolottes stream, the Olima stream, the Eastern
canal (Epinal Branch), the Bertramenil stream, the Docelles Trench
stream, the Virgin stream (or the 40 Weeks) and the Soba stream.
The Moselle, with a total length of 560 kilometers, of which 315
kilometers in France, originates in the Vosges mountains at the Bussang
pass and flows into the Rhine at Koblenz in Germany.
The supply
channel for the Bouzey reservoir, with a total length of 41.5 km,
originates in the municipality of Saint-Étienne-lès-Remiremont and flows
into the Avière at Chaumousey, supplying the Bouzey reservoir, after
having crossed twelve municipalities.
The Saint-Oger stream, with
a total length of 17.4 km, originates in the town of La Baffe and flows
into the Moselle in Thaon-les-Vosges, after having crossed seven
municipalities.
The quality of bathing water and waterways can be
consulted on a dedicated website managed by the water agencies and the
French Agency for Biodiversity.
In 2010, the climate of the municipality is of the mountain climate
type, according to a study by the National Center for Scientific
Research based on a series of data covering the period 1971-2000. In
2020, Météo-France publishes a typology of the climates of metropolitan
France in which the municipality is exposed to a semi-continental
climate and is in a transition zone between the climatic regions
"Lorraine, Langres plateau, Morvan" and "Vosges".
For the period
1971-2000, the average annual temperature is 9.5 ° C, with an annual
thermal amplitude of 16.9 ° C. The average annual cumulative rainfall is
1,194 mm, with 13 days of precipitation in January and 10.5 days in
July. For the period 1991-2020, the annual average temperature observed
on the nearest Météo-France meteorological station, "Épinal", in the
town of Dogneville 6 km as the crow flies, is 10.3 ° C and the average
annual cumulative rainfall is 907.0 mm. The maximum temperature recorded
on this station is 39.3 ° C, reached on July 25, 2019; the minimum
temperature is -18.9 ° C, reached on January 12, 1987.
The
climate parameters of the municipality have been estimated for the
middle of the century (2041-2070) according to different greenhouse gas
emission scenarios based on the new DRIAS-2020 reference climate
projections. They can be consulted on a dedicated website published by
Météo-France in November 2022.
pinal is an urban commune, because it is part of the dense or
intermediate density communes, within the meaning of the Insee's
communal density grid.
It belongs to the urban unit of Épinal, an
intra-departmental agglomeration grouping 12 municipalities and 61,488
inhabitants in 2017, of which it is the city-center.
In addition,
the town is part of the attraction area of Épinal, of which it is the
town-center. This area, which includes 118 municipalities, is
categorized into areas of 50,000 to less than 200,000 inhabitants.
The land use of the municipality, as it appears from the European database of biophysical soil occupation Corine Land Cover (CLC), is marked by the importance of forests and semi-natural environments (67.3% in 2018), a proportion identical to that of 1990 (66.7%). The detailed distribution in 2018 is as follows: forests (66.8%), urbanized areas (17.7%), industrial or commercial areas and communication networks (5.6%), meadows (4.6%), artificial green spaces, non-agricultural (2.8%), heterogeneous agricultural areas (2.1%), environments with shrubby and/or herbaceous vegetation (0.5%). The evolution of the land use of the municipality and its infrastructures can be observed on the various cartographic representations of the territory: the Cassini map (eighteenth century), the staff map (1820-1866) and the maps or aerial photos of the IGN for the current period (1950 to today).
Épinal is clearly divided into two poles, on either side of the Moselle. Right bank or historic district (city hall, courthouse, market, theater, basilica, prefecture, General council, restaurants, cinema) and left bank (shops, museum, train stations) or new town. Each of these two poles has an important place at its center; Place des Vosges on the right bank of the Moselle and Place des Quatre-Nations on the left bank.
Located in the heart of Europe, along the valley of the middle Moselle, Épinal is at the crossroads of commercial, industrial and tourist paths, at the crossroads of Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg and Switzerland.
Truly at the heart of the departmental road network, Épinal has had a
north-south service for about forty years (RN 57 / E23) located 75 km (0
h 40) from Nancy, 130 km (1 h 15) from Metz and opening access to
Northern Europe (A31) as well as Franche-Comté, Alsace and Switzerland
(RN 66).
In the east-west direction, the city also benefits from
privileged access to the Vosges West thanks to the RD 166 doubled
between Uxegney and Dompaire. A project was carried out in the 2010s by
the General Council to double the RD 46 from Épinal towards Alsace and
Saint-Dié-des-Vosges (Y vosgien). Indeed, the evolution of traffic
between Épinal and Rambervillers - from 6,180 to 8,160 vehicles per day
(an increase of 32%) between 1994 and 2004 - means that the Vosges
General Council has chosen to focus its resources primarily on this
section of the east-west axis. A new interchange with the RN 57 could
also be built in the Voivre sector in Épinal to connect this new route,
but the planned removal of the current Jeuxey interchange is disputed by
the population due to the numerous local flows in the sector, in
particular caused by the presence of commercial areas. Moreover, in
October 2021, after 1 year of work, the new Jeuxey interchange known as
"double glasses" built to streamline traffic between Epinal and the
expressway to head to Nancy or Remiremont is operational.
The RN
57 on the sector of the spinal agglomeration also serves as an eastern
bypass. More than 31,000 vehicles (12.7% of which are heavy trucks)
circulate there daily (figures from 2004).
The RD 166A, for its
part, supports northern traffic. In the long term, a south―south-west
ring road project is planned for the agglomeration in order to create a
real complete transit ring road.
Since the arrival of the Eastern European TGV on June 10, 2007, Épinal is now at least 2 hours 20 minutes from Paris with two daily round trips. At the same time, as part of a partnership with local and regional authorities, the creation of a multimodal exchange hub to facilitate travel and transfers between the different modes of transport has emerged. In addition, since 2008, the Association for the connection of Lorraine and the North of the Franche-Comté region to the Rhin-Rhône TGV, chaired by the deputy mayor of Epinal Michel Heinrich, has been working to ensure that the electrification project of the Epinal - Belfort railway line takes shape (the links to Franche―Comté and Southern Alsace are currently of poor quality). The electrification of the line would make it possible to connect the TGV Est to the TGV Rhin-Rhône. This opening of the South of Lorraine offers new perspectives for many travelers and important economic and social issues. Luxembourg and the cities of the Lorraine Furrow (Thionville, Metz, Nancy, Epinal) could thus be connected to the Lyon basin and the Great South; Epinal would for example be 1 h 56 min from Lyon.
Public transport: Urban public transport is provided by the
agglomeration under the trade name Imagine and is operated by the
company Keolis Épinal. The network consists of eight lines that also
connect some neighboring municipalities from the Spinalien city center:
Golbey, Chantraine, Dinozé, Jeuxey and Thaon-les-Vosges. 7 of the 8 bus
lines of the Imagine network pass through a central interchange hub
located on Place des Quatre-Nations. The Imagine network includes :
eight urban lines operating from 6 a.m. to 20:30 p.m. every day of the
week and on weekends with a reduced frequency on Sundays and public
holidays ;
on-demand transport in the former town of Saint-Laurent ;
a transport service for people with reduced mobility (PRM) called
Cap'imagine and carried out using several specially equipped minibuses ;
an evening network on Thursday, Friday and Saturday evenings until
midnight.
a P +R relay parking lot at the eastern entrance to the
city, next to the Congress Center ;
250 self-service
electric-assisted bicycles distributed in 30 stations equipped with
automatic charging stations under the commercial name Vilvolt.
The
operation of the Imagine network is entrusted by the agglomeration to a
private company (Keolis Épinal, a subsidiary of Keolis) under a public
service delegation contract that has been operational since January 1,
2012.
For a few years, all the buses of the network, a little
more than thirty, as well as the main stops have been equipped with a
real-time dynamic display system. The requalification of the Place des
Quatre-Nations into a central interchange hub for all the lines of the
network, and exclusively reserved for buses and pedestrians is being
planned, as is the continuation of the development of the network in the
Spinal agglomeration.
Since 2020, the Imagine network has
replaced all its vehicles with new hybrid buses, which are economical
and emit less CO2.
Shuttle: A completely free shuttle has been
set up to connect, in less than five minutes, the large free parking lot
of the Champ de Mars (2,000 places) to the city center. The shuttle,
100% electric, operates from Monday afternoon to Saturday, from 8:45
a.m. to 12:30 p.m. and from 13:45 p.m. to 19:30 p.m., with a frequency
of ten minutes.
Bike paths
Bike paths have been set up since
the early 2000s in the city center by the city and the agglomeration
community of Épinal. The network of cycle paths is intended for
commuting to work and frequented above all for leisure. A large track
connects the port to the Bouzey reservoir (13 km). The city has also set
up a bicycle rental agency at the port (Blue Bike). The urban Community
of Épinal has notably installed several short-term rental electric bike
stations (VilVolt).
Épinal is located on the main cycle routes
and Greenways of France and could also be part of the EuroVelo 6 (EV 6)
program.
River transport
As part of the work carried out at
the port in the early 2000s, a very special effort was made for boaters.
There are 32 mooring points with water and electricity terminals that
are in operation. The sanitary facilities are at their disposal at the
captaincy. The attendance of the port is constantly increasing. The port
of Épinal is connected to the southern branch of the Eastern Canal, also
called the Vosges Canal (since 2003).
Air transport
The
airport of Épinal-Mirecourt (33 km) welcomes a company specialized in
business flights in France and Europe. Its activity is divided between
business flights, charter flights, private aviation and training flights
(training of civil and military crews). Epinal is also located one hour
from the Metz-Nancy-Lorraine regional airport and two hours from the
international airports of Basel-Mulhouse-Fribourg and Luxembourg.
Since 1921, Épinal has also had a small airfield with a 700-meter
grass runway. The airfield is located just north of the agglomeration,
in the town of Dogneville. The Vosges aero-club is a Lorraine aero-club
operating on the site.
The number of housing units in Épinal was estimated at 19,042 in 2020. These housing units in Épinal consist of 15,932 main residences, 372 secondary or occasional residences as well as 2,738 vacant housing units.
Since 2004, the municipality has embarked on a vast transformation
program of the city center in conjunction with the Urban Displacement
Plan (PDU) approved by the municipality in 2000.
First started
with the renovation of the rue des Etats-Unis and the rue des Minimes,
then by the construction of a new footbridge and the complete renovation
of the old covered market and its surroundings, the works then aimed at
the redevelopment of the town squares and its streets: place de la
Chipotte, place Stein, place Pinau, quais de Contades and Sérot, Ferry
quays and Lapicque.
The SNCF train station sector has also been
restructured.
The redevelopments were therefore accompanied by
different reflections, on gentle travel, accessibility to all public
transport, the parking offer, and finally on the traffic pattern.
The recommendations of the urban travel plan served as a basis for
work; various studies (vehicle counting, origin-destination
identification of flows) made it possible to verify certain hypotheses
and to adjust the proposals.
Concretely, the Victor-Hugo / Dutac
axes, Nancy street and the quai des Bons-Enfants will be put in two
directions and the direction of the rue des Petites-Boucheries will be
reversed. A bypass loop of the city center will thus be formed to take
transit out of the hypercentre and the Place des Quatre-Nations will
have a unique vocation as an urban transport hub in 2011.
The
city center of Épinal has more than 4,300 on-street parking spaces, more
than two thirds of which are free. Paid parking is concentrated on the
hypercenter, with almost 1,400 spaces. By limiting parking in these
areas for a long time, the objective is to ensure the rotation of
vehicles to facilitate customer access to shops and services.
The
company Q-Park, which has been in charge of parking by delegation since
2008, has carried out a renovation of the car parks under construction
(Train station, 205 places; Covered Market, 38 places; Saint-Nicolas,
410 places) and created enclosed car parks: Clemenceau (57 places) and
de-Lattre (57 places). In addition, in 2018, a new car park was created
in construction to compensate for the disappearance of the parking lots
of parking spaces and the Hearth.
In 2019, the Edmond-Henry and
the Hearth squares located on either side of the Saint-Maurice Basilica,
are completely renovated to make it an important meeting area of the
city center of Épinal. In 21 months, the squares that served as austere
parking lots have turned into a real pedestrian zone. A fountain is set
up around the basilica while jets of water will refresh, in summer,
passers-by between the terraces of the restaurants. Two years later, it
is the turn of Abbé Friesenhauser Street to make a new look, giving the
old town a very good quality of access