About 2nd Arrondissement

The 2nd arrondissement is also known as Bourse, this arrondissement is located on the right bank of the River Seine. The 2nd arrondissement, together with the adjacent 8th and 9th arrondissements, hosts an important business district, centred on the Paris Opéra, which houses the city's most dense concentration of business activities. The 2nd arrondissement is also the home of most of Paris's surviving 19th-century glazed commercial arcades. At the beginning of the 19th century, most of the streets of Paris were dark, muddy, and lacked sidewalks. A few entrepreneurs copied the success of the Passage des Panoramas and its well-lit, dry, and paved pedestrian passageways.