Max's enBlog: Bum

Jian Cheng Round Building

Walking on Zhong Qing North Road, Taipei, you can see a 3-storey fish bowl made of glass…oh, wait, there is nothing swimming inside. It’s a strange transparent building with some food stalls inside.

Jian Cheng Round Building, while looks like a modern architecture, can be dated back to the early 20th century. Its outlook has changed over the years according to policy and consumers’ needs; unfortunately, not always the latter the better.

In 1908, the Japanese administration built a round park where 4 routes met. The people came there to relax, so some food stalls gathered along. The busiest Taiwanese river port around that time was close, so a few dancing clubs emerged in 1920s near the park, which was believed to have the first night market in Taipei to attract club-goers.

However, when the Pacific war broke out between Nippon and America in 1940s, Taipei was bombed often, so Japanese administration suspended the market and reconstructed the park to be a shelter. After the ROC government took control of Taiwan in 1949, the round marketplace resumed and was as exuberant as ever.

Being near the main bus and train station, it had a very good location both for the customers and merchandise transportation. In addition to many food stands selling Taiwanese dishes like chicken rolls and rice-puddings, there were also some antique and grocery stores, with some musicians singing folk songs on the nearby streets.

“Its most prosperous time was between 1960 and 1971. Customers of the clubs would like to have some snacks after clubbing, so they all went to this place, making it stay crowded till the dawn,” says Chen Zhen Sheng, a third-generation inhabitant selling
Taiwanese oyster pancake there.

In the 1970s, as the traffic grew, the city government widened the Zhong Qing North Road and separated the market from the nearby buildings. So the round bazaar, containing mainly food shops then, looked like a “land islet” drifting in the centre of the intersection of 6 avenues, and gluttons had to walk cross the streets to enjoy the flavours.

Though the marketplace’s business went down gradually, store owners there managed to make profits, for the place had unique eating style and friendliness.

Chen says:” The middle of the round house was a small parking area, and there were some small routes, so you could just leave your motorcycles there and go out to get snacks from the stalls one by one. Owners were familiar with each other, so the last vendor you visited can count the total amount. Many people like this unique shopping way.”

However, the whole building became dilapidated after 2 huge blazes in 1990s. The situation grew to a point that some city councilors wanted to rebuild the area, so this market was reconstructed to be the Jian Cheng Round Building in the early 21st century. The architecture made of steel and glass is by the sidewalk, has award-winning design and is said to be environment-friendly.

But there used to be 97 food stands in the market. Now the number is less than 10.

It is a 3-storey building. The third floor, planned to be a coffee shop surrounding with a garden, is deserted now. The second floor had some restaurants which were soon abandoned. Only few vendors in the first survive.

Chen still has the same business in there, but he is disgruntled with how the government handles this issue.

“They never really listened to our opinions when planning this renovation project. That famous architect, who built the highest building in the world (Taipei 101), for his reputation had the final say.”

“Yes, this building did win an architecture award in Japan, but it doesn’t mean much. The business is sluggish here. We told the architect that its allotments are too small for cooks, that the customers’ vision is blocked by the columns, that this place can only contain less than 80 consumers at most, a relatively small figure compared to the staff.”

He was in fact saying those with a smiley face, but I can feel his anger, perhaps a little pain. Some old owners and the customers don’t recognize it as the classic round market, he says.

This is as bad as a reconstruction project goes. Professional urban planners have different views on the way to revitalize it, however, all their proposals require heavy investment.

Astonishing in some way, a shining new building sometimes functions much worse than the former worn one.

posted by Max.L @ 2:16 PM