TOPIC
1 : SMALL X BIG
Community is the group of people nestles
in the same area. Some may considered to have the same interest and having
common activities. Even though, they may come from different local which create
a diverse culture in that area. This also related to the urban village as
community being one of the elements that initiate village.
Urban village is the area that is
considered to have a low development according to the surrounding area. This
area then being called village as the smaller size compare to the whole
developed urban area they located in. They are heavily populated, lack of
infrastructure and overdeveloped. They composed of overcrowded multi-story
building and small alley to pass through. The culture in urban village is
diverse due to the context and communities that came to settle in that area,
local and tenants. However, they are known as the affordable renting area for
the newcomers.
The existing of urban village has three
main causes 1. Rural immigration 2. Natural increase 3. Administrative
reclassification. Rural migration may happen according to the poor economic in
their local, factor that effect their career such as climates or diseases etc. Administrative
reclassification is also one important factor which also because of the
inadequate space or urban development. The distinctly example is most China
urban villages.
According to the rapid growth of
economic in China, the urban village emerges. This creates a social, economic,
architecture and culture transformation within that area. With the unstoppable
development of economic the cities continue to grow. The government needs to
occupy more space for urban area. Rural villages were now surrounded by urban
area and this causes them to loss their local career’s area such as farmland.
This leads to the abandon of their old career and seek for job in the cities.
With the flow of the time urban area continue to expand, so they transform
their house and area into the rented house for newcomers or immigrants in order
to get more profit. Of the following this initiates urban villages in China.
Due to the transformation of the owners, the structure and pattern of the
urbanism of each villages are the same but having more buildings that are not
plan by the urban planning and this creates a diverse pattern of urbanize. The
village became rapidly denser, the building is bigger and the walking path is
narrower compare to the old village and human scale. Meanwhile, developed city
are the city that considered having a well-being of citizen, good economic
growth, and good income for people. People prefer to be modernize and having
civilize well-being. In other words, it is a small dots living in the expanding
big circle.
Every roles have an important to the
demolished and presence of urban village which is also related to the
development of city. Firstly is the government that gives an emphasis on
the economics of the city which leads to the expansion of the area. This process has an impact on the existing
rural village by consuming the agricultural area. This forces that rural area
to seek for new jobs and become urban village eventually. Moreover, after being
an urban village, government and urban citizen see the urban village as a
problem instead willing to improve them. This leads to the demolition of urban
village and redeveloped them in to general technology area instead. Rather than
give an importance to the smaller point to improve them the government tends to
look on the bigger point of view which give the urban village as a chaotic
area. Secondly is the community role, by being the population that has
the most impact on the expansion of the city, they also being a part of the
expansion of the density in urban village. For instance, Shenzhen economic has
been rapidly raise this create an urban sprawl due to the expansion of the
city. With the rapid urbanization in Shenzhen many people want to come and work
here. Though, those people mostly have no ID cards, come from rural area and no
money etc. this made the low-rents house in urban village became more popular and give the
local high profit. This leads to the expanding of the renting house and made
the urban village became to have poor condition such as lower sunlight came to
the street due to the high renting house, narrow alleys and high crime rate
etc. Moreover, this create a highly difference between culture, local culture
and immigrants’ culture. Thirdly are the developers, rather than giving
a hand to improve the village along the improvement of the city they prefer to
ignore this problem. This is commonly instinct of human basic that want to
earns more profit to this company so they choose to help develop the inside
city instead. Indeed, the developer also needs to give a hand to the government
in order to make their home develop in to a better way. They need to find a way
to improve the city not only the aesthetic that appealing to the foreigner and enhance
economic growth but also the life of the citizen. For instance, the services of
community and the architecture improve their country. This leads to the higher difference between
hierarchy of citizen and villagers and create a controversy between them.
Lastly is the corporation, they need to help developers such as make
some business in the area that needs the better economic etc. Moreover, they
need to make a fair trade or business to the regular. This may be the way that
they can help improving urban villages.
TOPIC
2: OLD X NEW
By transforming the urban village in to more develop one this may erase
its unique characteristic. As stated in the above argument, most government
tends to abandon the urban village rights and demolish their hometown in to
developed city within few years. Of the following, it creates a new cultural,
standard culture for the area. The technology came along with the high-rise
building to promote the well-being facilities of that location. The appearance
of the city is generally in the same dialogue such as high-rise building, many
infrastructures, no relationship between neighbor and no trace to the original
place of how and where it used to be etc. They are considered to be modernize
and having high-profit. Indeed, its uniqueness has disappeared; in the other
word their culture has been lost and become more of having technology and money
culture. Even though, some urban village can preserve its uniqueness such as
Dafen village, Shenzhen, China. According to the book “Villages in the City: A
Guide to South China's Informal Settlements” states by Stefan Al, Shenzhen has
an attempt to develop its uniqueness of its culture. Dafen is then developed
and transform the oil painting industry in to the creative city. This village
then was heavily promoted to the local government and the state. Moreover, the
way they give benefit to the artist and their historical preservation made they
become attractive and being a paradigm of how to preserve their historical
culture and develop their village as the same time. Another important example
is Nantou (Xin’an) old village. This village is well-known for the preservation
of the old culture. Though, not the entire village is made of past
architecture, it contains much evidence of layering historic changes throughout
different types of building, density and etc. It shows how the transformation
of the building is like and this give the sense of what is the living habit and
activities in the past and how the space that occupied by the dese number of
people compare to the newer period. Moreover, this create uniqueness to the
villages too which is needed to be valued and preserved. The old building is a
traditional architecture with delicate ornaments in every detail. Some also
imitate the atmosphere inside the house in order to let the outsiders or the
tourist feel the past feeling. While on the other hand, the new building is a
more modernize building such as an apartment, the shop house or the commercial
building etc. This is what we see in our everyday life. Though, the medium
between this two is the interaction of local people. The most important part is
this village can preserved the community interaction between people such as the
market and the neighborhood relationship. This is one of the valuable things to
preserve. According to the high-modernize thought, people tend to prefer to be
by themselves more than interact to people for example, there is no
neighborhood relationship in condominium like in village. This became a
peaceful and attractive sense of this village.
By knowing the detail of each village may help to understand and want to
preserve the village more. To develop the village there is many ways not only
demolished and redevelop it. By using each village’s rare culture may help
raise the economics of not only the village but also the city too. Moreover, it
can create a new eye-catching atmosphere to every people including the tourist.
Though, giving the most importance to preserve may not be the best idea. For
instance, the Seventh Bi-City Biennale of Urbanism\Architecture (Shenzhen) or
known as UABB has concerned about this idea and use the different as the
attraction to the exhibition and this can also promote the positive thinking to
the villages. They will see the creative mind and soul, and positive energy of this village. Even though, because of the flowing of the technology and needs
or wants of people being too preserved may make the life-habit become low in
position such as no development in people, high crime rate etc. Of the
following the development and preservation need to be balance in order to make
the best out of the uniqueness.
In order to preserve and use the unique of each village as the government
role need to understand and think of the way to use this creative point as a
benefit to the economic to develop the city and the village. This can also help
less the prejudice of the city’s citizen to the villagers. Even though, as
stated above, too much concerning on preservation may not be good for villages
and city, because every things need to be developed. The government together
with the community, the developer and the corporation need to find the
way to combine the old and the new together in order to improve the urban
village. The community needs to find the best solution to raise the
option of how their village should improve in the future in order to make the
government know what they need to do and how. May be the leader is the one who
can help raise the question and give the solution from all the villagers in
order to get the best solution. Moreover, the community also needs to respect
and response to their duty in the village too such as know what is right and
wrong etc. The developer and the corporation need to help the
government to find the way. This may also give them good profit and profile to
future project too.
TOPIC
3: PERMANENT X TEMPORARY
In accordance with the economic rapid growth, the rural people and
immigrant then flood in to the city. Although, with the low budget and no
citizen rights, they need to find a cheap rent house to live and it need to be
nearby the location of their job’s location. The urban village is the solution
for them. The urban village, then, become a dual-community, the community that
have a relationship between two side and their culture are different from each
other. This creates a relationship between the local people and immigrants as
only a landlord and tenants. Since the culture and the language may not be the
same. This make the local exceptionally cautioned the tenants. Moreover, they
expect the tenants to pay as much as possible for their benefit. Some owner may
live in the other place to improve their live and left the place for tenants,
but some may still live in the same place for generations. Though, the dominant
of the population is the outsider but the local still own the rights as the
owner of the area.
The population structure is different in village. The notion of living
for the local and the outsider are different. For the permanent living of the
local who lives for generations or decades, they see this as the place of
working and living space. It is their life. On the other hand, the outsider
sees it as the temporary things. To be more specific, the visitors see the
village as the event to come, the immigrant see the village as the short-lived
habitat in order to get the better career. These two purposes are considerably
different. Moreover, while the local live and rely on the rental income and
their relaxed career, the immigrants are mainly construction workers. This
leads to the boundary inside the communities.
The community plays the important roles by being the one who
drive the act. The community is divided in to two groups, local and renter. If
the local have the willing mind to develop the village they need to be fair to
the tenants. Their village can be promotes by letting the visitor come and
improve their economic. While, the immigrants has no choice but accept it. The government
needs to check for the deceive action of the landlord to make the equal right
for the humanity. The developer and the corporation may not have a big
effect in this condition.
TOPIC
4: INDIVIDUAL X COMMON
In accordance with state of the hierarchy in the urban village the
common rules are set by nature itself. The factor is the citizenship to claim
the rights for their own benefit. It states the rules and set the owners of the
space in each location. If the outsider or the one who not belong to that area
use or invaded the space, the owner have a rights to claim their rights
immediately.
In the past the individual space or the owner’s land might be large due
to the agricultural career etc. With the flow of time and economic it creates
expansion of urban city lead to the loss of land to the government. As in urban
village, since the immigrant has flood into the area this also has an effect on
the individual space and the common space. The individual space that the
immigrants get is according to the money they have and the area the landlord
assigned to them. To use more area or borrow it is general to ask the
permission from the owners. The common space is shared between locals, tenants
or immigrants and the outsiders. In contrast, the landlord or the local still
own the rights in the individual area of the tenants, together with the citizen
ID the local has more advantage in the rule statement. For instance, if the
outsiders want to use the space of the local they need to ask for the
permission first. The owner have a right to let them use or not and the
outsider have to choice but accept the fact. The common space is known for
every body’s property. As the time goes by, the population in increasing
continuously, in contrast the common area has the same amount of space. This
leads to the over density in the common area and the function become more
useless. Moreover, due to the bore of not functional common space the space can
be abandon.
In order to be fair to everyone, the government needs to set an
obviously clear-cut of rules, otherwise some owner may play trick to get the
profit to their own. The community’s members also play the key role in
this point. They are the one who make an act to claim the right. If the owners
are untruthful it may cause a problem or crime, so they need to be truthful to
themselves and others. To develop the city the developer may have to initiate
the business or the attraction in to the area and this may leads to the
argument between villagers and the developer. The developer may raise
the choice to give them profit to use that space or they have rights to
negotiate if the owner play trick by using the rules state in law. The corporation
may help the developer make a business area here. For instance, UABB 2017will
hold an exhibition in Nantou old village in order to make this village an
example to seek for the new urban growth method instead of redevelop them.
Since the village get the benefit and with the agreement with Shenzhen
Municipal Government, the owners of the exhibition area are keen to allow them
to use in order to improve their urban villages. Though, some may not agree,
the government already sees this as a hand to help the villages this make UABB
get the rights to use the space. Not all the rights they get the private of the
owners are still being with the owners. For the common space the government,
community, developer and the corporation need to negotiated between each
other to have the best answer for the community. Community need to ask for the
most wanted things and the governments need to considered and analyzed. After
the developer need to help government find to way to improve that area and ask
the corporation for help too.
TOPIC
5: PARTICIPATION
Due to the citizenship of the local villagers and being the landlord,
this make them have a more rights to do things than the tenants or the
immigrants and the outsiders. Even though, it is the dual community, in
consideration of developing a sustainable urban village, the villagers need to
be keen to their responsibility and the thought for all. In the other words the
participatory is important to help things get better in the future. By having
all community’s members participate in the democracy voting when having
some alternative about developing the village to consider. By having all
comments and hearing the wants from all this will make the leader or the one
who responsibility to me a medium for the contractor know what is the best for
the village. Though, the some immigrants may live here in a short period, they
can have their own policy to set the hierarchy of the one who live here more in
the future. Some local may not pay attention to this village anymore, due to
the choice to live in the urban city. Therefore, if their individual space is
ask for the permission to use as the improvement of the city, the landlord need
to understand and let them rent that area or may use it temporary. The government
also needs to find the way to promote the unique and this may let to ask
permission for the villagers to use s some area in the village as the location
for the big event. This leads to the democracy in the community to
search for the agreements and understand in the same notion. By promoting, the
developer need to find the events that is benefit to the villager and may offer
a benefit to the villager to let them understand how the promoting can help
this urban village developed. The corporation may have an action here by
being the sponsor to help promote the event and this can also give them profit
too.
For instance, Nantou now are being capture by its uniqueness and this
makes the developer and the government seek for the solution to help the
village develop by not demolished them. The solution is using the big event,
UABB, as the exhibition to let people know more and impress with the amenities
of the village. Which the exhibition will highlight the site-specificity and,
in view of the distinctive spaces in the villages. The topic will start from
everyday life of villagers to the in-depth of reflection and exploration on
village. This leads to the Exhibition occur in Nantou which will bring the
visitor come and helps the economics of Nantou. According to this exhibition,
Nantou will get more attraction to the world and possibly will have an event
occur here in the future.
CONCLUSION
With the flow of the changes of times and technology, everything are
always change. Too much preservation of the uniqueness may not be the best
solution for developing the urban village. It may be the dangerous factor
instead of good one. Even though, the uniqueness is the key that can change the
way urban village was, sometimes it cause a dangerous. Though the dangerous is
also according to what is the uniqueness in different village too. The
dangerous is meaning that it is not being able or has no idea of how to
negotiate with the future. For example, Dafen village is unique in the act of
people this can be negotiate to the future because the behavior can be adapt
easier more that the object or existing
element. In contrast, Nantou village has the unique by its old ancient
architecture. Even though, some are already renovate by using only some part of
the old architecture and change into apartment, this still not consider being a
solution. Because of the unawareness of the future of how the changing or each
apartment will affect another and the village structure and atmosphere this
leads to the unpleasant of the view. Moreover, the ancient architectures are
getting under the preservation but what is the point of preserve without using
the function of it. As the time pass, the surrounding are also need to be
change. Indeed it cannot stay unfunctional like this or we can consider it as
useless.
According to Eugène Viollet-le-Duc, 1855, he states that “To restore
a building is not to repair it, nor to do maintenance or to rebuild; it is to
reestablish it in an ultimate state that never existed before.” We need to
think about what is really meant to this village, the function, the space etc.
and use the unique as the elements to push further the benefit to the villages.
The way of mediating between preservation and development is needed to be
founded. Even though, the preservation is being increasing through times, the
future are also need to be concerned. There should be the way improving
villages with technology and modernizing going along with the preservation of
the uniqueness together in order to maintain the better future to the next
generation. This leads to act of negotiating of each role in order to find the
best solution to make the village better. Moreover, the explanation to the
community and to the world is needed to be given in order to renew or redevelop
the old architecture in to old+new architecture. As a democracy this is the way
to make a better solution for the urban villages. People need to understand how
to world change and why things change. The past is made by the others, though
it is good to learn from the past but we are also taking a responsibility to
develop the future to the next generation too.
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| The possibility of developing Nantou ancient village |
