There Is No Place Like Home

Some years back, I accepted a Fulbright to teach urban studies at the Université de Lorraine in Nancy, France. The textbook for one course featured four cities considered to be the world’s best planned. 

Paris, Nancy, Bath in England—no surprises there. But the fourth, Kansas City, as in Missouri! OMG! Last month found me in three of those cities and reminded me anew of why Kansas City made the cut.

The year my wife and I lived in Nancy (NON-SEE) just happened to be our 10th anniversary year. Every 10 years, we make a point of going back. I still have not figured out why companies would rent a car to a clueless foreigner who just stepped off an overnight flight, but happily, they do. As a caraholic, I could not be without one.

With about an hour’s sleep, I set off for Nancy, a four-hour drive due east of Paris. Complicating matters was that, unknown to Joan and me, the GPS was set to “avoid toll roads.” We spent an hour slogging dopily through Parisian suburbs before correcting the setting, but our four-hour drive had turned into five.

When the Fulbright people sent us to Nancy those many years ago, I was relieved. I did not want to be assigned to Paris. In Paris, you are just another American. In Nancy, a city of about 100,000, we were rock stars. Thanks to our towheaded two-year-old, we made many good friends. All these years later—French style—they remain in place, and they remain good friends.

Of the four sets of people we met with over six days, all of them—happy to say—shared our worldview. What pissed us off, pissed them off. Given my tenuous grasp of French, it is much easier to affirm what someone says in their language than to contradict them.

We could not have been there without a car. Our closest friends, for instance, live at the summit of a quaint hilltop village outside Nancy in a home that has been in the family for generations. The view from the garden is so spectacular in so many directions that the Nazis commandeered it for their reconnaissance staff. Indeed, this 800-year-old village of 300 people has seen more history than the state of Arkansas. It is not easy to reach in any case, but impossible without a car.

Although few Americans know about Nancy, the city is renowned for its urban design. As a UNESCO World Heritage Site, Nancy attracts tourists from all over the world. At the center of the city is the spectacular Place Stanislas, a vast pedestrian square ringed by outdoor cafes and museums. It is a truly wonderful place to visit.

Nancy almost perfectly fits the model “15-minute city” as imagined by American urban planners. They would be happy to know we walked every place we needed to go—breakfast on the square, the museums, church, dinner. In fact, I walked about five miles a day.

But there’s a catch: The city was designed in the 18th century. Locals have had nearly 300 years to adapt their lifestyle to the design. This means not only lots of walking, but it also means lots of conforming to the mandates of the various governing bodies. 

As a case in point, I had originally booked a hotel on the Place Stanislas before learning that I would have to ask permission from the local authorities to even drop my luggage off. Instead, I booked a hotel about a half-mile from the square that promised on-street parking and nearby garages. 

I imagine the person who wrote the line “on-street parking” had a good laugh with his friends. The underground parking garage cost close to $40 a day. Like all such garages in France, the ramps are frighteningly narrow, and the parking spaces impossibly small. To spare her the drama, I always dropped Joan off before parking. I was thrilled to survive the week without scraping the car against the many walls begging me to scrape them.

Walking back one night from the “nearby” garage—about a quarter mile—I had to ask myself: what happens when you can no longer walk five miles a day? For all its virtues, France is no country for old men, let alone old women. I could not envision living there.

My wife took the train into Paris a day before me, and I was free to roam the countryside. This you can only do by car. I set my sights on Verdun, turned off the GPS, and headed out on a series of back roads. On the loneliest of these roads, I passed a cemetery, backed up, and pulled in. 

Unsure whether it was open, I maneuvered past the gate and wandered in awe between the crosses, row on row. I thought I was the only one there until I heard a voice call out behind me. Given the French penchant for rules, I presumed I was about to be yelled at. I wasn’t. Instead, an angelic young Francaise offered me a personal tour. In heaven, the 4,000 young Americans buried at St. Mihiel surely envied me.

The nightmare drive into the heart of Paris later that day erased any lingering thought I might have entertained about retiring to France. Upon finding my wife’s hotel unscathed, I literally thanked God for my deliverance and asked forgiveness for wishing death on three separate motorcyclists.

If nothing else, the drive into Paris eased my return home. KC, I remembered upon arriving, is to drivers what Nancy is to walkers, a potential UNESCO World Heritage Site for caraholics. 

With its seamless sprawl, splendid boulevards, and ample freeways—more miles of them per capita than any city anywhere—Kansas City minimizes the stress in our lives and encourages niceness. It is no wonder my textbook recognized the city’s essential virtue. 

Now if only our planners would do the same.

PUBLISHED JUNE 27, 2023