Is Paris the right model for the Sydney of 2050?

France is also the world's most visited country, so Paris accommodates huge numbers of tourists in summer. Then there are the jobs in a metropolitan area that houses 11 million people, double the size of Sydney.

In comparison, Sydney has just 0.6 million residents within an area equivalent to central Paris, mostly living in one and two storey buildings and scattered clumps of medium and high-rise. It's a long way from the density that supports high levels of walking in Paris and warrants investment in one of the world's 'thickest' metro systems.

Writers like to invoke the ideal of Paris because they know we find its look and feel irresistible; who wouldn't want Sydney to look like and be like Paris? But what makes Paris "look like Paris" is unlikely to be emulated in Sydney or anywhere else.

What differentiates it from other cities, including other European cities with similar built form, derives largely from a set of stylistic building elements that comprise the visual minutiae of daily urban life. It's those characteristic doors, balconies, windows with railings, street signs and lampposts (see Paris – what's that certain something?).

Sydney in 2050 will likely be a denser place where walking and public transport have a much higher mode share than at present, but it won't look or function much like Paris. It's legacy of built form is different and demands its own solution; it'll necessarily be different to Paris, probably very different.

We can learn lessons from cities like Paris, but we must be wary of the dangers in importing solutions that might work well elsewhere but are inappropriate to local circumstances.