Essonne


Essonne is a French department in the region of Île-de-France. It is named after the Essonne River.
It was formed on 1 January 1968 when Seine-et-Oise was split into smaller departments.

History

The Essonne department was created on 1 January 1968, from the southern portion of the former department of Seine-et-Oise.
In June 1963 Carrefour S.A. opened the first hypermarket in the Paris region at Sainte-Geneviève-des-Bois. Based on the ideas put forward by the American logistics pioneer :fr:Bernardo Trujillo|Bernardo Trujillo, the centre offered on a single site a hitherto unknown combination of wide choice and low prices, supported by 400 car parking spaces.
In 1969, the communes of Châteaufort and Toussus-le-Noble were separated from Essonne and added to the department of Yvelines.

Geography

Essonne belongs to the region of Île-de-France.
It has borders with the departments of:
All of northern Essonne department belongs to the Parisian agglomeration and is very urbanized. The south remains rural.
In descending order, the cities over 25,000 population are: Évry-Courcouronnes, Corbeil-Essonnes, Massy, Savigny-sur-Orge, Sainte-Geneviève-des-Bois, Palaiseau, Athis-Mons, Vigneux-sur-Seine, Viry-Châtillon, Ris-Orangis, Yerres, Draveil, Grigny, Brétigny-sur-Orge, Brunoy and Les Ulis. Milly-la-Forêt is an example of its more rural communes.

Main sights

The department's most high-profile political representative has been Manuel Valls, Prime Minister of France from 31 March 2014 to 6 December 2016. He visited its main town Évry to deliver remarks following the Charlie Hebdo massacre of January 2015.

Current National Assembly Representatives

Demographics

Population development since 1876:

Place of birth of residents

Tourism