The history of Saigon on the long term is closely linked to the river that shares its name. This communication focuses on three main aspects of the interactions between the town and its water network. The first part examines some key elements of the urban history of Saigon. The city’s shape is due to the French military presence in Cochinchina. In 1790, Gia-Dinh is redesigned as a citadel on the Saigon River, and there are still traces in the current urban morphology of the ancient canals. But the master plan is really drawn decades later. From 1862, the French Navy design and build Saigon, as the main naval base and capital for the conquered Cochinchina. The second part presents how the civilian power inherits of this grown-up city, at the turn of the century. The historical archives reveal new concerns and approaches in the management of water. A micro-historical approach allows seizing the making of the city “seen from the bottom”. The construction of the current area of Ben Thanh Market on the Boresse marsh in the early 20th century appears as a good case study. The issues of the early twentieth century echoes, to a certain extent and on different scales, that of the beginning of the twenty-first century. Finally, the last part focuses on the economic function of the Chinese arroyo during the twentieth century. From this local experience, the perspective to nowadays industrial zones of Ho Chi Minh City, is analyzed in terms of specialization and location.

Keywords: Saigon river, urban history, canal, water network, naval base, wetland, marshes, Ben Thanh market, industrial zones, Chinese Arroyo

Within the framework of the Saigon River project (funded by Région Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes – France) a WebGIS has been made ; from old maps of Saigon to coring locations, it is a digital mapping interface providing access to a part of data produced. This interactive app may then be considered as a way to share the results, but it is not its first aim. This custom-made online tool was created at the early beginning of the project to strengthen the link between the teams. Actually, if disciplines and approaches are different, the space of study is the same. The WebGIS, as “collective container”, has raised cross-disciplinary discussions, everywhere it showed unexpected spatial relations between topics.

Keywords: WebGIS, digital mapping, interactive app, collaborative work, data