Lanes are Shanghai. They connected major roads and crisscrossed through the city, encompassing neighbourhoods and create the fabric of the city. They offer quiet pockets where people can convene and children play without the hinderances of the automobile. Twisting within the town, they create a fabric of walkways and passages that offer those that stroll into them the chance of surprise and a glimpse into the culture and mixture of Shanghai. Lanes provide shade in the summer time and a quicker route in the cold winter days. As Manhattan is defined by its skyscapers, Shanghai has its row of lane houses blanked the city. They defined the city, or at least they did.
As modernisation took hold in the 1980s and 90s, there was a surge of redevelopment that had given way to a new China. High rises took the place of older homes, and one after another, lanes were taken town to make way for these new towers. Instead of leaving passageways and routes in between these new towers, blocks were encircled by walls in order to give its inhabitants private gardens and club houses, bloc after bloc the city that once held multiple routes began to disappear. Removing the old for the new has a place in every society and civilisation, but what replaces it should be considered and weighed in on. The alleys that once blanketed the cities are no longer, making long street blocs the only accessible routes in downtown, much of the new developments did not have street front stores so this also disappeared. The local cobbler, grocer and repair shops were moved out, the lanes taken away, and the knots in the city fabric were created.
Moving to today, another phenomenon is sweeping away the architectural fabric of the city. There is a new war being placed on store-fronts, promising to bring another change in the city. The planning bureau and city government is going backwards, promising to remove any store or shop that does not have the proper licensing or approval. Thousands of shops that have been operating for decades are being shuttered. Rumours exist that this is for bringing the population under control or that as the city matures, proper zoning must be adhered too. Looking at developed countries this could be argued. The more you enter into developing countries the more chaotic the structure of the retail exist. Stores are opened in peoples homes and licensing is ignored in order to have some capital creation among the masses. 1st tier cities and wealthier nations take another approach, zoning off areas of commercialism to separate the residential and commercial areas. This defining approach allows the separation of consumerism and where people live, creating a definable zone where certain commerce can take place and where living is encouraged.
To watch this take place in real-time is surrealistic. Sympathy, in all shapes is abound, and shops that are forced to shutter take on another shape while people are allowed outside to sell their wares, or they sell them through newly created windows that were once doors. Other instances are not so gentle, where cinder blocs are placed in front of what was once a vibrant shop. One after another, families are displaced and businesses are disrupted. Progress again taking its toll on the people that lie in its path. How far this will go is hard to say, some blocs are being totally displaced while others are staying. Like the lanes that were taken away before, there seems to be no particular plan that is being followed, simply a sporadic shot at remaking a city in the minds of a few that happen to be in charge of today with little care of study on the impact it has on the people that call this place their home.
Progress and change is difficult, it is my no means easy to develop a company or a country. What seems obvious to preserve is the first thing that needs replacing by others when viewed at different angles. Right and wrong is a perspective, argued in silence in a place where social discourse is best dampened and never brought to the surface. In its place, lanes and stores disappear with little fanfare or question, to be replaced by hastily put up walls and buildings all in the name of progress. What could have been thoughtfully put together and carefully planned is instead hastily rushed in a mad effort to appeal whatever figure might be calling for process in the first place.