Avenue Habib Bourguiba can be read as a scripted infrastructure for a display of power both historically and in the present political framework. Paved over layers of ecological history, civilian agents interrupt and re-script the image of the avenue through political demonstration, challenging the curated notion of the streetscape. Anchoring the thoroughfare, the ministry of the interior operates as a controlling force that currently demands protection from, and jurisdiction over the avenue below. The urban planter is deployed through a gradient of architectural scales, not ignoring the political reality of the streetscape, but shifting the benefit of an urban security gesture to serve the local population and protect the avenue for the civilian. The presence of police power is challenged, rejected, and gradually overtaken by the forgotten layers of ecological history.
