News from China usually comes to us in spectacular, often off-beat pictures. Last week, there was the story of the elderly couple who stood up to the local government in Wenling (and lost) after refusing to sell their house, which was impeding construction of a new business center. The surreal image—a lone house stranded in a sea of black asphalt—made waves in the blogosphere. We’re sure the same fate awaits these photographs, taken at a construction sit in Taiyuan, Shanxi province; at the center of construction stands a small dirt hillock crowned by one sole tombstone. Continue.

The circumstances behind the strange pictures are similarly tied up with new development and the subsequent relocation of peoples and their property. In this case, a local family turned down an offer of $160,000 in exchange for a patch of burial land in which laid their ancestors and on which there were plans to build a cluster of skyscrapers. As you can see, construction continued anyway, leaving only the smart dirt mound in the middle of a large concrete bed.

Prior to construction, villagers were paid to relocate the graves, reports The Sun. Yet one family abstained and refused terms, leaving developers to instruct workers to build around the landmass. The hill stands in the middle of a concrete pit studded with steel rebar, the foundation of a future tower.

Photos via The Sun

by Architizer Editors

posted in Money Shot Uncategorized

tagged bizzarchitecture, china, construction, development, gravesite, Shanxi, skyscraper, Taiyuan, tomb

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