Reference

A city is easiest to read in the buildings nobody chose to keep. The grand monuments are designed to be looked at, but the ordinary streets, the awkward corners, the half-forgotten passages between two newer blocks, these tell you how people actually moved and lived. When a city redevelops too quickly, it loses this second, quieter record. What replaces it may be cleaner and more efficient, but it often has the curious flatness of a place that has no memory of itself, only a plan.

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