Lyon Abroad

Lyon is city of doubles. Not just one river running through it, two. Not just one hill overlooking the centre, two. And now Lyon itself is to be duplicated. Not just one Lyon, two. Buti Saeed Al Gandhi, an entrepeneur in Dubai, plans to build another Lyon out east. As well as a second Lyon-2 university, a small-scale city based on Lyon, with a hotel school run by Paul Bocuse, museums, and an Olympique Lyonnais football training centre are to be created there. But buildings without history? Msueums displaying artefacts without meaning? How can that feel anything but false? On the other hand, a Lyon in the sunshine sounds rather wonderful. But surely rebuilding a city without any of the problems of the original - I presume the Dubai version won't include graffiti and social division - will end up with a sanitised theme-park version of a wonderfully diverse and, so far, completely unique, city. And, really, a Lyon without the French? Impossible.