Would have put these together, but it was too long. Please excuse the double post.
Quote:
Originally Posted by GoNative
I understand there are many reasons why so much architectural heritage has been lost but I still think it's a great shame. I mean if you travel through Europe so much architectural heritage has been preserved. Whole towns have building overlays and restrictions so that the character of the town is retained. Nearly every town you go through is an historical wonder. There's a few towns like that in Japan but really only a few. Most in my eyes were pretty damned ugly. It's a real pity in my opinion. For a country that has such an old and established culture I was kind of blown away by the lack of aesthetic beauty in most towns.
|
It`s my understanding that this is largely because of the massive level of bombing Japan experienced during the war. Anything that could burn, burnt. This included all the old historical buildings. There are patches here and there that made it through without being completely destroyed, but almost anywhere that could be called a town was hit.
They rebuilt with incredible speed - but housing the huge number of displaced people was the number one concern... So ugly boxes it was. They`re the fastest to build. The population boom of the 50s and 60s that followed kept the quick-housing trend going.
It`s sad to see pictures of locations prior to the bombing... And then just a couple years later with everything replaced by "emergency" housing.
These days, people are taught to be almost overly terrified of fire, so you see houses built using as little flammable material as possible. But I suppose when you hear stories of one bomb starting the fire that wiped out the entire neighborhood... Or one stove that fell over during a minor quake that destroyed 50 houses... people get scared.
Quote:
|
And for gods sake why oh why can they not put the powerlines underground????? The powerlines are about the ugliest thing in all Japanese towns and cities. Some places do have them underground and what an incredible difference it makes!
|
Remember the places with them underground, and check their electrical outages after an earthquake. Electricity is lifeline #1. You can string the lines along the ground should the poles fall to deliver power. If the underground containment pipe breaks, there is nothing you can do for quite some time.
People ALWAYS protest putting the wires underground for these reasons. Even in areas that have most underground, they will usually have some percentage of them above ground that power hospitals and other vital facilities.
You can occasionally see footage of workers rolling wire by hand in areas where there was a serious earthquake to get power to hospitals and shelters... But when the wires are underground, you need to get equipment in there to dig them up - not to mention that the entire bundle has to be shut off. (Shutting off power to vital locations in the process.)
The wires are ugly as crap and look awful, but as long as Japan has earthquakes, I will oppose putting them underground.