We come in peace!
(Mars Attacks, Film by Tim Burton, 1996)
We must have alarmed some people with our curiosity into the builders activity this morning.
The doorbell rang just after I had finished my breakfast and was packing my bag for the short trip down south.
"We work for the council and we don't know what happened this morning, but some residents must have come out and scared the builders away." - "We want to assure you that the fact that we have to demolish these bay windows has nothing to do with the proposals for the area." Words from council workers I had never met before.
So, lets look at this claim in a little detail:
The bays are peeling away from facades they have been attached to for the best part of last century, we can see that. Gaps and cracks on the houses that are boarded up look especially bad, they are not been lived in for a long time, another fact we can't ignore. Whose houses are they? They used to be social housing, managed by housing associations. Liverpool city council bought them all, and 'secured' them. 'Securing a property' is the wording they use, 'tinning up' is much more evocative: when new, shiny corrugated iron, with time getting grubby, rusty. Like tins without labels and bulging lids; they will explode, no doubt. But who would bet on how much longer it takes for a bulging tin to burst? Same with structural movements in a house. A wall bulges out, foundations subbside, cracks appear. But when does a house finally collapse? The council says: "Now!". What do you do if you get worried about a crack in your house? You get advice, you get it fixed before it is too late. Unless you really want to see your house fall down. Then all you have to worry about is that nobody get's hurt. Isn't that what the council is doing? Yes, they have a duty of care, they would be in deep trouble if a playing kid would be buried under rubble from a house that is in their responsibility. The next best thing to collapse is demolition, a controlled collape.
Can you see my line of argument? The partial demolition has to do with the proposed complete demolition. Look at it the other way: If this corner of Liverpool would be considered as a valuable, important part of the city, as being the home of an exciting mix of people from different cultural backgrounds, people that deserve to be heard, people and houses with more stories to tell than a questionaire can reflect, then the council would be in trouble for letting deterioration on their own houses come that far that demolition is their only option! (Written on the train to London)
"We work for the council and we don't know what happened this morning, but some residents must have come out and scared the builders away." - "We want to assure you that the fact that we have to demolish these bay windows has nothing to do with the proposals for the area." Words from council workers I had never met before.
So, lets look at this claim in a little detail:
The bays are peeling away from facades they have been attached to for the best part of last century, we can see that. Gaps and cracks on the houses that are boarded up look especially bad, they are not been lived in for a long time, another fact we can't ignore. Whose houses are they? They used to be social housing, managed by housing associations. Liverpool city council bought them all, and 'secured' them. 'Securing a property' is the wording they use, 'tinning up' is much more evocative: when new, shiny corrugated iron, with time getting grubby, rusty. Like tins without labels and bulging lids; they will explode, no doubt. But who would bet on how much longer it takes for a bulging tin to burst? Same with structural movements in a house. A wall bulges out, foundations subbside, cracks appear. But when does a house finally collapse? The council says: "Now!". What do you do if you get worried about a crack in your house? You get advice, you get it fixed before it is too late. Unless you really want to see your house fall down. Then all you have to worry about is that nobody get's hurt. Isn't that what the council is doing? Yes, they have a duty of care, they would be in deep trouble if a playing kid would be buried under rubble from a house that is in their responsibility. The next best thing to collapse is demolition, a controlled collape.
Can you see my line of argument? The partial demolition has to do with the proposed complete demolition. Look at it the other way: If this corner of Liverpool would be considered as a valuable, important part of the city, as being the home of an exciting mix of people from different cultural backgrounds, people that deserve to be heard, people and houses with more stories to tell than a questionaire can reflect, then the council would be in trouble for letting deterioration on their own houses come that far that demolition is their only option! (Written on the train to London)
posted by cairns at 11:29 AM
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