The architectural rant

Not so long ago Alexandria was a city of low rise buildings, with front gardens where children used to play safely under the view of their families. Around 30 years ago such model begun to crumble to leave space for a so called "progress"; the owners of the houses were (and still are) seduced by the idea of selling out making massive profits...(dinero es el unico dios verdadero?). Nowadays there are few of the original buildings left, like tiny creatures surrounded by a world where they will not be able to survive. They were condemned to certain extinction long time ago... this one in my street reads the proud statement: "this building is not for sale, for more information call lawyer fulan"...i wonder for how long.

Note that the colour of the building in the photograph has been enhanced because i felt like it :P I have already showed some high buildings rising from relatively small bases thanks to the black magic of concrete, every square centimeter meter is treated like a potential 13 floors high building. This is the block where our flat is, note that the big space in the back of it is a new construction site.

Due to this particular way of understanding (??!) urban planning and development, the density of population in Alexandria is tremendously high. Such high density posses a further problem in a developing country like Masr, as the deficient public transport system is unable to cope with all these people, collapsing the streets with more cars, with the consequent degradation of the air quality. Furthermore, as buildings are separated of each other by a couple of meters, ventilation and natural lighting are poor. If that was not enough, the small gaps between buildings are not the paradigm of cleanliness, as people simply chuck stuff in there. An illustrating example is the beauty of the "view" from our living room:

Other consequences on the quality of life is that the reception of radio signals and mobile phones inside those buildings is very limited. So we are forced to hang outside the window for having a proper conversation...And by the way, green areas are not to be found anywhere, except inside private residences of relatively wealthy people. I wonder what is the responsibility of governments and designers (together with clients). Dont they realise that besides the great wonderful money they are making, they are leaving a legacy of houses and neighborhoods where it is not very desirable to live in? Surely that does not matter as none of them live in a place like miami, they can live in some nicer place...unlike most of urban population in the world.