I'm working on an assignment and just wanting to clarify this. There is literature (Engels regarding working class Londoners) talking about the plight of the urban poor, but surely this would not have influenced upper levels of decision makers in Paris. I know that the renewal was done at the behest of Napoleon III, but is this the first case of it being done without any "need" for re-building?
For a New World example Cahokia was built over the site of an existing village. The original village was demolished, the grand plaza was leveled by hand, and a new city made of prefabricated houses was placed there while massive mound construction began.
The entire city of Cahokia as of the 1050's was a planned city. The layout of the plaza and the mounds was in reference to religious beliefs of the occupants. There doesn't appear to be any evidence that this rearrangement of the city was caused by a disaster.
Source: Cahokia: Ancient America's Great City on the Mississippi By Timothy R. Pauketat