The residential structure in Vauvert can be divided in three zones, which are partly separated, and sometimes closely intricated in one another:

  • the city heart, or old city.
  • collective buildings in what can be called suburbs (although this denomination does not correspond to the real size of the city, nor to the appearance of this area, where the buildings never exceed 4 stories).
  • new residential areas with individual cottages.

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    Marché

    This residential structure shows clearly a distribution of the population according to various parameters, such as

  • ethnical origin (there is an obvious tendency for families of same origin to gather in the same living areas).
  • social and professional characteristics.
  • the date of installation in Vauvert.

    • It thus appears that:

  • The Vauvert population, residing for more than 10 years in the commune is mainly living in old houses and individual cottages. It is an adult population between 40 and 60 years, with a significant percentage of seniors. This component includes the first European immigrants (mainly Spanish) who have moved in the 70’s and 80’s from the collective buildings into other accommodations.
  • Another part of the population, whose date or arrival is more recent, lives in the new peripheral districts, in individual residences, often bought with long-term bank credits. Only a small percentage of this population group lives in "old" low cost housings built in the 60’s and 70’s.
  • A third and last part of the population is composed of made up of migrants from Morocco and Algeria to a fairly high percentage. This population has had so far little access to new residential districts, or in a broader sense to individual housing, (although some families must, on arrival, live at first in old, decayed houses before being accepted in the cheaper and nevertheless more salubrious flats of the low-cost buildings).

    • These specific elements create, or better said strengthen, an effect of spatial segregation, and can be summarised by saying that the integration of the different components of the local population has not been achieved yet. But this specific aspect can be seen as a problem, but also as a stimulating challenge for the times ahead, which the local protagonists have already begun to cope with.