Tree-lined Dongsi Batiao hardly looks like the site of a smoldering
urban struggle. But during the last two months, the "Eighth Hutong
in the Dongsi area" inside central Beijing's old inner city has not
been so quiet.
On April 15, the Dongcheng District housing construction and
planning bureau posted a notice in the neighborhood stating that a
real estate developer has gained the development rights of the area
and residents shall move with relocation compensation by May 26.
Someone has splashed the poster with tar.
Dongsi Batiao is one of the historic neighborhoods given
preservation status by the Beijing municipality's 2002 Conservancy
Plan for 25 Historic Areas in Beijing Old City.
Hu Xinyu, managing director of the NGO Cultural Heritage
Protection and its volunteer Friends of Old Beijing, points out
that under the plan, renovation must be in accordance with set
rules and hutong must be preserved. Commercial development is
out.
But the Dongcheng District's housing construction bureau's order
to move tells a different story.
It is reported that redevelopment of the area was originally
approved by the municipal urban planning bureau in 2001. With a
total investment of 570 million yuan ($74.5 million), plans include
a high-rise office building and four residential buildings.
But that's not all. According to Xia Jie, whose family owns
house No 11, a neighbor, checking with the district housing bureau,
found a stamped document stating that a road 20 meters wide will be
built through the neighbor's property.
Farther down the hutong past some shops, a corner store whose
owner has recently moved has been gutted - roof ripped off, walls
bashed in. It was taken by some residents as warning of things to
come by the Zhong Bao Jia Ye development company.
The battle lines are drawn between the district housing
construction bureau, the developer and some of the hutong residents
pitted against Batiao residents who own their siheyuan (traditional
courtyard houses) and heritage experts.
Batiao is not your designer hutong. Built in the Yuan Dynasty
(1271-1368), its glory days - when it was home to writer Ye
Shengtao (1894-1988) - are long gone. Behind the siheyuan gates,
many of the once grand courtyards are filled with makeshift shacks.
Even for people living in the original gray brick buildings, hutong
living can be primitive, with toilets out in the alley and no
central heating.
Of the 11 courtyard houses with a motley mix of some 90
families, seven houses are privately owned and four belong to the
local district. Many who don't own their residences and whose
housing was arranged by the local district, are willing to move on,
providing they get what they consider fair compensation. In
contrast, those who have been there for generations want the
preservation status of the hutong secured.
Those who would demolish this hutong argue that it contains
nothing of cultural value. Those who would save it point out that
the traditional one-story siheyuan architecture, with its
gracefully curving roofs, will disappear along with the community
way of life. Both merit preservation.
Tenants have dinner inside the courtyard owned by Xia Jie's
family.
In No 3 yard, Gao Changling, 68, said: "If this hutong survives,
I will definitely rebuild my home as it was." She sees Old
Beijing's hutong as "dikes around the Forbidden City". She's been
connected to her siheyuan since her mother-in-law bought it in the
1950s. As she talks, her son's 11-year-old turtle roams around the
yard.
A man on crutches who would only identify himself as Gao said he
was troubled by the dangers of out-of-control trees, unreasonably
low compensation, and on-again, off-again development. When it
comes to preservation, he says: "I think these courtyards should
have been removed long before. They are too old." As for his
neighborhood credentials: "I was born here, I lived in this hutong
for more than 40 years and I do have an emotional attachment to it.
However, I can do nothing about the big tree." The rampant roots
caused a wall in the Gao home to collapse inward 10 years ago and
he says the danger of structural damage is only increasing.
As for relocation, he says: "People living in narrow spaces
would love to move. For example, a couple in our yard lives in a
building only 8.5 square meters wide and that's still not the
smallest. I think most residents support relocation if they can get
reasonable compensation. I think it ought to be more than 30,000
yuan ($3,400) a square meter at least, instead of the 8,090
($1,050) the developers offered. If I think what they offer is not
acceptable, I'll stick to living here."
As for the possible outcome, he says: "This is the third time
the developers have considered the project. The first time they
came was in 2000. They copied all our identity and property
certificates in 2002 and then everything stopped for some
reason."
Xia Jie, 33, is a particularly articulate advocate for
preservation. Slim, attractive, a fourth-generation Batiao
resident, she traces the family's ownership from her
great-grandmother's purchase of the house in 1948 to the ravages of
the "cultural revolution" (1966-76). Xia Jie said the government
took away the deed to the house, restricted her mother and herself
to 12 square meters of living space, and moved in other people in
need of housing.
The government returned the deed in 1984. Now she is determined
to make sure the law is properly followed when it comes to the
hutong's future. Concerned that "all necessary legal procedures" be
followed, she has requested an administrative review by the
Dongcheng District law office.
Perhaps feeling the heat of preservationists' and public outrage
reflected in media coverage, Dongcheng District officials let the
May 26 deadline come and go. On May 27, they suspended demolition.
On May 28, Shan Jixiang, director-general of the State
Administration for Cultural Heritage, stated during a working
conference: "There will be no new development project in Dongsi
Batiao in the future." There maybe no local victories to celebrate
come China's Cultural Heritage Day on Saturday.
Those who know the articulation of State/local power say the
State Administration of Cultural Heritage is not the deciding force
here.
Meanwhile, the developer was reportedly negotiating compensation
with people staying in the publicly owned courtyard housing. And
Xia Jie was saying: "I'll wait for the results of the
administrative review."
She says it's not about money but a way of life. She makes the
point: "It's a sad thing if the developer wants to put a price tag
on something we really cherish."
(China Daily June 4, 2007)
