Roubaix is an industrial city in north-eastern France, near the border with Belgium. The area, with an industrial tradition behind it, fell victim to economic decline from the 1970s onwards with a crisis in the textile sector and this was aggravated by the 1974 oil crisis. During the 1980s, LMCU and the municipalities in the area launched a development programme which followed a strategy of interpersonal cooperation by means of projects intended to unify the area and through conversion to the tertiary sector. Investments were made by central government and the European Union which have led to the development of infrastructures, fostering the revival of the area.