http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/27/arts/design/27ouro.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
Lost in the New Beijing: The Old Neighborhood
HISTORICAL cycles that took a century to unfold in the West can be
compressed into less than a decade in today’s China. And that’s as true of
Beijing’s preservation movement as it is of the nation’s ferocious
building boom.
The explosion of construction activity that has transformed Beijing into a
modern metropolis over the past decade also turned many of its historical
neighb