Hmm...yet another New York Times article on Shanghai. Some editor at the times really likes this city. Haven't had the chance to run a LEXIS search, but I would bet that there's been a spike in Shanghai articles in the times over the past 12 months. Maybe I am here at the right time. Maybe I should try to score some writing gigs of my own.

Anyway the article itself describes a phenomenon that I've been seeing around me. Everything is coming down. Take for instance, the view from my old apartment, facing south. You can see the high rises going up all around. See those old two-story houses in the middle? It's pretty clear that they're all going down in the next year or two. An extension to the subway line is being built just south of the neighborhood, with a station immediately adjacent. So this is hot property for developers. By the way, this is just a 10 minute cab ride from the Bund.

Now I could cry for the lost architectural heritage, but it makes me wonder sometime. Those old houses look cute on the outside, but on the inside most are really disgusting. Even the residents don't like it. No matter how hard you clean, dust seems to always get in to dirty up the homes. Many lack natural gas which results in a lot of people cooking with coal, which contributes to the mess both there and in the air all around Shanghai. Most residents are happy to upgrade, the main issue is that they usually don't get to stay in the same neighborhood. The poor are shipped out to inconvenient suburban developments while yuppies (like me I guess) swarm in to fill up overpriced downtown locales (even though this neighborhood isn't really downtown, but you get the point.) Hmm...I guess they haven't heard of mixed income housing around here.

The point is, it does make sense to upgrade the housing stock around here. The population really requires it. I think you need to preserve some areas, as housing (not like the ultra-touristy Xintiandi, which has its charms, but is ultimately Shanghai's version of NY's South Street Seaport or SF's Pier 39. But the conditions of a lot of these neighborhoods are so bad, that the economic incentive is to tear down and start all over. The only hope is to designate a few small neighborhoods in very central areas for preservation, allowing people to gut interiors while preserving the exteriors. It'll be expensive, so such remodeling jobs will be of interest to a limited class of people. But convenient locations in historic areas should hopefully lure some nouveau-riche. It worked in SoHo.