A dying breed

Han Zheng, party chief of Shanghai, said that there are numerous outstanding architecture built in the past century located within a two-square-kilometer radius in the Hunan sub-district and that urban planners today have a heavy responsibility of protecting and preserving these structures, which have been home to a number of outstanding artists, educators, doctors and authors who have made great contributions to the country.

Apart from the Hunan sub-district, there are 11 other historical conservation areas in the city. Many of these old communities are known for their shikumen, or stone-framed gate houses, which have been recognized as an architectural style unique to Shanghai.

There were more than 9,000 shikumen complexes in Shanghai in 1949 and roughly three in four local residents lived in such houses, which also served as spaces for factories, banks, newspaper offices and schools, according to municipal records.

There are currently just 173 such complexes left in Shanghai and only a small percentage of them have been granted a city-level historical building status. The rest of them remain outside of the scope of protection by the authorities.

Feng Xiaomin, director of the cultural and historical data committee of the city's political advisory body, said that although authorities have invested much manpower and money in the protection and preservation of some shikumen houses in the past few years, priority is still given to land development and urbanization projects.

"Many of those shikumen complexes that were torn down in the past were so dilapidated that it would have been very costly to restore them. The residents did not want to pay to restore the structures, even with government aid. Besides, it was also a lot easier for authorities to just relocate the dwellers than to renovate the old houses," Feng said.

In February, a group of local political advisors suggested that these iconic red-roofed terrace houses should be included in the world heritage list as part of efforts to preserve them.