Wonderland

The scale of SSP is very interesting .On the street level, original buildings were built in human scale whilst new private estates look like giants who ate the "EAT ME" cake from the "Alice in Wonderland" story and grew to such a tremendous size. The exaggerated contrast between the old and new makes SSP looks like Alice's wonderland.

SSP is famous for the vivid street life,however,the "new giants” cover the sky，and seems like alien to the neighborhood.Some blocks in Cheung Sha Wan has already be replaced by those "modern giants",and the street market has been moved to business buildings in the  podium.

See the  spatial difference I illustrated below:

original street of SSP  V.S.  street occupied by the giants

The street view in the second illustration is just the status quo in some blocks in Cheung Sha Wan,and may be the future of central SSP.No more attractive street markets,only a few pedestrians walking by in a rush and the sidewalk turned from an active outdoor place into an aisleway carrying pedestrians and wheeled traffic.

This contrast remind me Jane Jacob's view about the relationship between  streets and the city“If a city's streets look interesting,the city looks interesting;if they look dull,the city looks dull."

market in the business building V.S. market on the street

Besides,SSP is a wonderland for skilled craftsmen and small traders because there is a lot of tiny stalls or shops although the shopkeepers are continuously struggling against spatial and temporal constraints.These shops and stalls are nexus of social and econimic networks and hubs of community memory,sth that is becoming rare in other new districts.

 

Start from the last day in SSP

Last day in SSP, I continue to explore the area where URP is about to take place,a few blocks to the southwest of the SSP station,followed the route I searched online:Yen Chow St.----Tai Nan St.---Yee Kuk St.---Haitan St.---Tung Chau St.

The Yen Chow St. Hawker Bazaar impressed me most, it's like a squatter fabric market and you can find almost any fabric you want with a good price.I tried interview the stall owners but they seemed to be Cantonese speaker and hate to be bothered,after be refused unfriendly several times,I was really embarrased,but fortunately，I successed to get an interview with an elderly owner even he didn't want to be in the camera that I only recorded our conversation.He told me they used to run their bussness in the underground mall where locates the tube satation now,and the government moved the market to where they were right now in order to make room for the station constraction, and they were promised to  stay here temporarily，but they have been there for 32 yrs since the promise from the government, and they don't know how much longer they have to wait for the promise to be achieved.

I never doubt the URP would give a better living conditions to the residents and  bussnessmen,but temporary placements seems to be a problem, especially for those lower income class.

the location of this market

 

And I found another replacement market under the West Kowloon Corrador, but this one is much better that at least they are phisical buildings.

Development of housing forms in SSP

50s~60s
1.Tong Lau with Arcade before World War Two

Tong Lau is essentially a balcony-type tenement building for residential and commercial use. The ground floor portion is reserved for commercial use, mostly by small businesses like food vendors. The upper floors were for residential use.Most of the exsiting Tang lau locate in SSP,a special view of old HK.

2.Squatter Village

After the war,thousands of  refugees came to HK and most of who cannot afford the rent of a room in the building,so they use wood and iron sheet to build squatters,and the Squatter Village in SSP was made up of thousands of them,but it was destroyed in the big fire in 1953.

60s~70s
3.Public Housing

Public Housing Project started after the big fire,the first Mei-Ho House was built in 1954 ,after that more public housing with better conditions were built，like the So Uk Estate.

Mei Ho House

So Uk Estate

70s~80s

4.Private Housing for middle class 

Bigger and better private housing were desiged for middle class,like Mei Foo Sun Chuen which was the first private housing estate  in Hong Kong and at the time of completion, the 99 tower complex was considered the largest private housing development in the world,accommodating some 70,000 - 80,000 people in 13,500 apartments.

Mei Foo Sun Chuen(Mei Foo Estate)

5.Rooftop Slums

Poor residents or new immigrants built rooftop slums,because the special community cannot afford a appartment,most of the slums were built on the Tang Lau

 80s~00s

 6.Luxury Private Housing

There were many private estates be built after the Mei Foo Estate,more supporting facilities were included like private club or gardens,much better living conditions than the public housing,but also,more expensive rent,only for upper and middle classes,and low income families still live in rooftop slums and old Tang Lau.

URP in HK

Hong kong's building stock is ageing rapidly.There are at present about 4000 buildings aged 50 years or above in HK,and the number will increase by 500 per yaer over the next decade,the condition of those buildings remain unsatisfactory and posing threats to public safety.

(a five-storey old building in Hung Hom collapsed in 2010 ,3 people were killed)

To address the problem of urban decay and to improve the living conditions of residents in dilapidated urban areas,the Urban Renewal Authority Ordiannce（URAO) was enacted in July 2000,which provides a new institutional framework for carrying out urban renewal,and the URA was established on 1 May 2001.

(official site of the URA)

The government strategy is the 4R which are Redevelopment,Rehabilitation,Revitalisation and Preservation,and they are supposed be carried out by the "People first,District-based and Public participatory"approach.

Strategy sounds reasonable,but has it really be pratically carried out as the government said ,as far as I know,most residents show a strong opposition.

(a video of gathering residents in Sham Shui Po for a walking tour)

After the crit,I continue working on  how the URP influenced people's life in Sham Shui Po,and I found out that the URP was an "slash and burn" process for those residents especially the lower income class which is the main part of the community.They expect a better living condition but cannot afford the new replacements.They are now facing the problem that going to be torn up from the neighborhood they love and be thrown to an unfamiliar circumstance,which would also bring the lovely community of SSP into a dead conner.

I downloaded a pamphlet of the URP,which mentioned the objectives of urban renewal,one of them said"preserving as far as praticable the social networks of the local community",it's a little bit satiric,I guess the community they are going to save is more valuable ones for the government，the poor one in SSP is out of the range.

SSP has a really good position and traffic condition that show a higher  economical protential to be developed in those old areas,that's maybe why the lower income class  would not find a place for them in the future and going to be replaced by the middle class.But one crucial thing the government forget is the disappearance of the local community would be a super loss for this district.

Jane Jacobs said in her book "The Death and Life of Great American Cities"that "These networks are a city's irreplaceable social capital.Whenever the capital is lost,from whatever cause,the income from it dissappears,never to return until and unless new capital is slowly and chancily accumulated".I totally agree with the definition she gave to the networks,the "irreplacable social capital" and now which of SSP are facing being amputated and biscected.

So I redefine the forgotten corner of SSP as the "The invisible & irreplaceable social capital of this district which is the forged neighbourhood network".

under the bridges

space under the bridges are always interesting

some are no man's land

some are prosperous

⋯⋯

full of surprising activities

curiosities of the city

High line park ——survival of the old rail track

The elevated 1930s railroad track in New York City has been transformed into an innovative and contemporary public park.

City with water still feel thirsty,maybe there is a solution for waterfront problems,also for HK?

Urban reclaiming the shore
 
Taller 301 was awarded First Prize in the International Architecture Competition Urban Landscaping in Kyiv for Euro-2012. The project entitled Reclaiming the Shore consists of 413 hectares between the Dnieper River and the City Center.
 

Problem: The highway acts as a barrier between the city and the river.
Solution: Reconnect the city and the river through landbridges.

Vertical& space under the bridge ——both possible solutions for high density

Vertical villages for European Snowbirds

The Solar Park South International design competition awarded French firms OFF architecture,PR Architect & Samuel Nageotte for their entry called Verical Villages in Calabria, Italy. The competition played with the theme of a ‘Solar Highway’, re-using sections of the Salerno-Reggio Calabria highway soon to be decommissioned by the Italian Highways Authority.
 

The inspired form for the “Vertical Village” arose out of the viaducts morphology, particularly the piles of the struction. The deck therefore becomes the reinforcement of these residential areas through commercial spaces, equipment, medical centres and leisure spaces.

A conceptual project in my hometown where is called city of hills

Magic mountains

The urban concept for the GCBD reinstates the mountainous feeling deep into the very dense and urbanized areas of Chongqing. The new skyline consists of a composition of inhabited mountains. The mountain peaks match the high-density centres; the lower reaches of the mountains resemble areas built with low density, whereas the valleys are green open spaces.