La catastrophe d’AZF

Abstract

The AZF disaster in 2001 was a turning point in the transformation of the Toulouse region. The nature of the reconversion that is taking place on the site of the chemical cluster is evidence of the difficulty of dealing with a post-traumatic landscape over a long period of time. The image of the site - a territory which emerged from the "subconsciousness" of the inhabitants of Toulouse during the decades preceding the disaster and which has subsequently become associated with the tragedy - is what the actors, decision makers and members of civil society, have tried to change during the years following the event. The axiological transformation was initially intended to be radical : ‘reconciliation’ with the site through health and the emergence of the Cancéropôle, a large, wooded campus that reconnects with the natural environment of the River Garonne. However, twenty years after the accident, blockages, the relative halt to the initial project, the traces of the accident voluntarily or involuntarily preserved, and the observed fragmentation of the territory bear witness to a diminished desire to partake in a common project. This raises the difficult question of the reconciliation and coexistence of the different perceptions of the landscape among different generations and social groups, made even more complex by the effects of the disaster.

Keywords

• Toulouse
• Cancéropôle
• post-traumatic landscape
• disaster
• AZF
• memory