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Posted

The Chinese city of Zhuzhou, the second largest in the province of Hunan, is being pressed under the tremendous pressure of growth. Home to many factories and textile mills, residents are seeking new ways to live close to work while preserving the spaciousness of the countryside.

Thus, these wonderful photos of McMansion housing atop a five-story shopping center in the central district of Zhuzhou.

One must understand that before the last 3 decades, places like Zhuzhou were, in the most literal sense, feudal village enclaves of subsistence agriculture criss crossed by rail lines. (Actually, that describes most of China outside of Beijing and Shanghai, although some Nationals would demur.)

Like I said in some of my notes, the place is manic beyond understanding; this kind of stuff doesn't raise an eyebrow for your average Chinese. It's unused space....of course there should be houses.

Or, as we might say, they're making it up as they go.

Posted

That picture brought to mind the photo below. A clever cover for a Seattle Boing plant during wwll. What looks like the suburbs is the plant roof.

Click to Enlarge
tn_201282182312_Factory95.jpg

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Posted

Yeah,

They tore that plant down a few years ago. There was a little bit of hand wringing over that decision even though the "neighborhood" had been gone since the war.

Kurt,

Any more about the story? Are these homes lived in by store executives? Are there going to be more homes added and this turned into a neighborhood?

ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!!

Mike

Posted

HA! I've been saying that China is like America in the 1950's; now I see it's like the 1880's. We're way more alike than any of the goofy news media manages to convey.

Posted

Time to fess up.

The factory was built in 1880 by H.A. Moyer. The 2 and a half story house on the roof, an "architectural gimmick," according to a 1937 newspaper interview with a Moyer family member, was never inhabited -- it contains elevator machinery and rafters

Moyer built carriages. Business must have been booming to spend that kind of loot on an elevator penthouse.

Posted

Where did you see it? The place I pulled it from indicated they were homes.

I have no idea; I just found the concept very 21st century China.

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