From 1832, when Bone was captured by French military engineers, to 1846, when the first plans for a port were drawn up, the engineers were more concerned with protecting the town than opening it up to the sea. Perceived as a worrying frontier, prone to invasion and foreign intrusion, sea fronts have always suffered from the disadvantages of their frontier location. For the first two decades, the shores of Bonois remained as they were, punctuated by forts and lazarets, giving them the face of the archetypal French military and historical port-town. Against this backdrop, our approach focuses on examining and restoring the plans for port facilities built during the French colonial period, in an attempt to revisit the effects of the port's proximity to the city.