“Deconstruction then identical reconstruction. This is the hypothesis which, according to Tisséo, is the most probable concerning the fate of the Toulouse war memorial during the construction of the third metro line. This building, built in 1928, officially called “Monument to the glory of combatants”, is located at the crossroads of the tunnels of line B and the future line. To spare the forty-year-old plane trees on the esplanade, the town hall has chosen to build the new station very precisely below this “triumphal arch”.
This decision taken, three hypotheses were studied. The first, the most spectacular, consisted of moving the monument in one piece by sliding it on rails. She is now dismissed. The second, the simplest, consists in “consolidating” the building, in reinforcing it so that it does not collapse during the underground works. But in “the dialogue” with the National Heritage and Architecture Commission, which will have the last word, Jean-Michel Lattes, the president of Tisséo, has the intuition that it is the third option that holds the rope. That of a dismantling, the time that the construction machines operate on the battlefield.
The opportunity to discover inaccessible parts
Pending the response, the union committee of Tisséo even voted on February 16 a deliberation launching the market to entrust this giant puzzle to a specialized company. “As the union council is not scheduled to meet again before the end of April, we preferred to anticipate”, explains Jean-Michel Lattes, who knows how to manage a “demanding” schedule for an effective commissioning of the end line. 2028.
If the premonition becomes reality and the war memorial temporarily disappears from the landscape, the idea is to find “a nearby exhibition space” for spare parts. Toulouse residents could thus closely admire the details of the sculptures and engravings of the upper parts. The operation would also be accompanied by a “very extensive” restoration.