Episodically, the question of the ground floor returns in the news of cities, during a conflict of uses at the foot of buildings, an unfavorable economic situation which accentuates the vacancy of commercial premises, or even when life in a new district is struggling to emerge. In the Canton of Geneva, the issue is now exceeding the observation: it is a question of anticipating in view of the many urban operations in progress and to come. This is particularly the case in Lancy, where the municipality has implemented a strategy in order to ensure the programming of the Rez in consistency with the needs of the inhabitants but also with the objectives of the promoters. More than a technical circular, this strategy is a toolbox designed to frame the action of the city while placing the dialogue at the center of the processes. Whether it is to “make city” in new districts or perpetuate a diversified activity in existing neighborhoods, the city of Lancy assumes a public coordination policy between the various stakeholders involved in the factory of its ground floor.
Land feedback
It is over the feedback that the city has measured the interest in treating the ground floor as an urban issue in its own right. As the administrative advisor Damien Bonfanti recalls1in charge of the city’s economic promotion: when it took office in 2015, the Chapel district came out of the ground with eighteen residential buildings … and only one tea room. But also a single post of town planner within the town to support all the achievements. More recently, the Pont-Rouge district, inaugurated in 2024, suffered some initial failures despite a more substantial arcades offer. In the absence of consultation between the various owners and managers, the commercial establishment is still looking for its balance. It has given rise to situations such as the installation of two Italian restaurants for the same clientele, or even direct competition between a physiotherapy firm and a neighboring health center. The difficulties encountered in Pont-Rouge, but also in other projects where the municipality has a low land mastery, served as a trigger for the implementation of an urban policy and its operational component.
The singularity of the approach of the city of Lancy is based on the development of a strategy dedicated to the activation of the ground floor and applicable throughout its territory. This is part of the charter objectives Grand Geneva in transition one you Cantonal climate planwhose municipality has declined its own version. Concretely, she intends to support the production of arcades dedicated to local shops and services, short circuits, initiatives of the social and solidarity economy, and, more broadly to the animation of neighborhood life. Simple to say, complex to implement: the approach requires a series of internal adjustments, particularly in terms of human resources and planning, and is based on a share of experimentation. Far from being isolated in this commitment, the strategy of the city of Lancy contributes to a reflection shared between several Geneva municipalities, whether within the framework of the Praille-Acacias-Vernets project (PAV) or by observing which takes place on the side of the Rolliet district in Plan-les-Ouates2.
Because in Lancy, as elsewhere in the canton, municipal administrations face a regulatory vacuum concerning the ground floor. Unlike housing, subject to the general law on development zones (LGZD) which regulates their distribution to contain speculation and ensure social mix within neighborhoods, the legislative supervision available to the State and the municipalities remains limited When it comes to adapting the ground floor to the needs of residents. When they are not occupied by bicycle premises or housing, they are mostly designed for commercial uses. Arcades are proposed to the Geneva market conditions, that is to say high rents, and their activity often depends on external economic dynamics, which can lead to vacancy. To cope with it, prevent or mitigate the effects, but also to open the ground floor to unprofitable or unprofitable activities, certain public actors, accompanied by their private partners, start unpublished policies and experiments.
A strategy, several possible
To pass occasional observations and actions to the affirmation of an urban policy, it is above all a theoretical framework that it was necessary to mobilize within the Lancy Planning Service: training of collaborators, recourse to external experts and analysis of experiences carried out in Switzerland as abroad, in particular in France, where the mix of the ground floor is also a topical subject. This approach made it possible to achieve in 2024 in a summary which poses, on the one hand, an inventory of the tools available to the municipality to engage in the activation of the ground floor, and, on the other hand, recommendations for implementing the strategy according to standard scenarios. Formalized in a short document for internal use, this strategy is neither regulatory nor prescriptive. It is a decision-making instrument on several levels, which allows the municipality to position itself as well upstream of the projects, during programming, in downstream, to improve the quality of the ground floor or reserve spaces for certain activities.
Among the mobilizable tools, regulatory instruments such as the localized neighborhood plan (PLQ) and other assignment plans in the sense of LAT, which make law. This type of tool nevertheless presents the disadvantage of being particularly heavy administratively and ineffective in detail of the assignments of the ground floor. To expand its field of action, the strategy also considers more flexible tools, such as permanent distinct rights (DDP, implemented in the PAV project) or even conventions (for example, public-private agreements of the districts of the pond in Vernier or Rolliet in Plan-les-Ouates). There are other more or less used proposals, and on a smaller scale, such as adapted rents, public sublet, the creation of a neighborhood agency or land or programmatic studies, calls for projects and other incentive measures. This succinct inventory offers an overview of city levers for the city for municipal teams, while specifying the human and financial resources required for the application of each tool.
Thanks to a fun device, the second part of the strategy offers nine scenarios arranged on a matrix which crosses two variables (ill. P. 12): the status of development of the district and the land capacity of the city. On the first depends the margin of intervention maneuver, in other words the financial impact: to intervene in an already built level costs more if the municipality is not the original owner. It can acquire arcades, split them, offer them to calls for projects to occupy them with suitable rent; But also to do otherwise, to serve as an intermediary between associations of traders and donors or to issue good to support trade, as during the pandemic. The second axis turns out to be the most decisive, however, because it initiates the city’s decision -making autonomy and strongly directs its negotiations with private partners. If the full land mastery constitutes at first glance a privileged lever for intervention on the ground floor, it nevertheless remains closely linked to choices and political postures.
To intervene? A political choice
On current projects on its territory, the city of Lancy therefore advances on a balance beam. It is not a developer, although it builds and has real estate; Its mission remains mainly regulating, even if it can be proactive on the PLQs by demarcating the owners of the plots concerned, like the promoters. The municipality acts when an opportunity arises, with a specific objective: the improvement of the quality of life of its inhabitants, based on its resources and, now, on its ground floor strategy. Any decision remains subject to the approval of the administrative council, which ensures the justification and proportionality of public intervention, as well as to the municipal council for budgetary issues. The developers also find their interest there, the city plays the role of interface, by raising information on the ground and the expectations made during consultation sessions in changing neighborhoods.
But even more than coordinator, the commune of Lancy also took on the role of programmer in the districts of Surville and Semailles, in collaboration with inhabitants and developers (ill. P. 13 and opposite). A paid strategy for the latter, which emerge with concerted market studies. By defining the intervention perimeters, the neighborhood life centralities or the level of intensity of the activities expected on the ground floor, the exercise posed the framework of a political action coupled with pragmatic proposals. If the requests of the population give pride of place to small businesses and associative premises, in Lancy as elsewhere, the presence of large classic economic actors remains to activate certain places. A large or average surface, underlines Damien Bonfanti, still ensures a function of attractor, capable of generating passage, and thus supporting the activity of the independent wine merchant next door. We are certainly far from the immediate urban revolution, but public action concerning the UNZ evolves and invites us to rethink the role of municipal administrations.
While the canton is densified and the cohabitation is tightening, the city of Lancy and other Geneva municipalities send signals as to their involvement to ensure and reassure the quality of life that will be found at the foot of the buildings. The joint care, by the public and private sectors, of the general interest, without contravening compliance with free competition in the allocation of ground floor is not easy. It pushes in search of new partnership relationships and the experimentation of strategic tools whose effects will only be measurable in a few years. These dynamics also engage in a form of indulgence towards certain districts at the start poorly adjusted, which are now used to revisit the know-how in terms of the ground floor. Even built, the urban project is not frozen.
Notes
1. Interview carried out on 11.04,2025 with Damien Bonfanti, Vincent Davy and Tobias Da Silva (commune of Lancy)
2. In the PAV project, which associates the cities of Lancy, Geneva and Carouge, the conditions of provision (rent, land status, etc.) for buildings welcoming public facilities are called to be adjusted in order to modulate the offer on the ground floor. For the Rolliet district, nearly 40% of the ground floor areas will be made available to neighborhood activities and managed by a cooperative thanks to a financial montage to do this.