Roubaix

Sister cities

• Bradford
• Prato
• Mönchengladbach
• Skopje
• Covilhã
• Sosnowiec
• Bouïra
• Verviers

History

During the repression of January and February 1894, the police conducted raids targeting the anarchists living there, without much success.

Geography

Roubaix occupies a central position on the north-east slope of the Métropole Européenne de Lille: it is set on the eastern side of Lille and the southern side of Tourcoing, close to the Belgian border. As regards towns' boundaries, Roubaix is encompassed by seven cities which constitute its immediate neighbouring environment. These municipalities are namely: Tourcoing to the north and the northwest, Wattrelos to the northeast, Leers to the east, Lys-lez-Lannoy to the southeast, Hem to the south and Croix to the southwest and the west. Roubaix, alongside those municipalities and twenty-one other communes, belongs to the land of Ferrain, a little district of the former Castellany of Lille between the Lys and Scheldt rivers. As the crow flies, the distance between Roubaix and the following cities is approximately: to Tournai, to Kortrijk, to Brussels and to Paris. The land upon which Roubaix stands belongs to the plain of Flanders. The Roubaisian area stretches on an east-west oriented shallow syncline axis which trends south-southeast to the Paleozoic limestone of the Mélantois-Tournaisis faulted anticline. It consists predominantly of Holocene alluvial sediment depositions. It is flat and low, with an elevation drop of only over its . The lowest altitude of this area stands at , while its highest altitude is meters above the sea level. From that century on, the ensuing industries, with their increasing needs for reliable supplies of goods and water, led to the building of an inland waterway connected upstream from the Deûle and downstream to the Marque and Espierre toward the Scheldt, which linked directly Roubaix to Lille. Opened in 1877, the Canal de Roubaix crosses the town from its northern neighbourhoods to its eastern neighbourhoods and partially flows…

Most-observed species

• Yellow-legged hornet

  Vespa velutina Lepeletier, 1836 · Insecta
  7,991
• muskrat

  Ondatra zibethicus (Linnaeus, 1766) · Mammalia
  4,837
• Common Wood-Pigeon

  Columba palumbus Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  3,951
• Canada Goose (canadensis Group)

  Branta canadensis (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  3,664
• Rose-ringed Parakeet

  Psittacula krameri (Scopoli, 1769) · Aves
  3,639
• Eurasian Magpie

  Pica pica (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  3,396
• Eurasian Blackbird

  Turdus merula Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  3,387
• Great Tit

  Parus major Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  3,230

Most recent

• M 2.8 — 2008-09-12
  1 km NNW of Court-Saint-Étienne, Belgium
• M 2.7 — 2008-08-09
  1 km SW of Ottignies, Belgium
• M 2.6 — 2008-08-09
  0 km NW of Ottignies, Belgium
• M 2.5 — 2008-08-08
  1 km SSW of Ottignies, Belgium
• M 2.6 — 2008-08-08
  1 km SSE of Boussu, Belgium
• M 3.2 — 2008-07-14
  1 km SW of Boussu, Belgium