Provide Paris with drinking water: was the first goal from the Ourcq canal, inaugurated in 1822 and whose bicentenary is celebrated this year. But the emperor who wanted this connection between the Ourcq river and the capital and decided to build it by decree on May 19, 1802 (29 Floréal of the year X) never saw it finished: Napoleon Bonaparte died a year before the completion of the works.
