Watching the excavator reduce her work place to rubble, 65-year-old Cheng Pao-yueh (
Cheng has sold rice porridge at the Chien-Cheng Circle (
PHOTO: CHIANG YING-YING, TAIPEI TIMES
"I don't know what I'm going to do now. My heart just aches to see it torn down like that," she said.
The NT$600 million, 16-month project is part of Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou's (馬英九) ongoing efforts to revitalize the city's older districts.
Supervising the demolition project yesterday, William Chen (
"As soon as the demolition and clean-up project is complete, which may take about a week, we will plant trees and lay out lawns. The reconstruction project itself, however, may not begin until May," he said.
The Chien-Cheng Circle, located at the intersection of Chungching North Road and Nanking West Road, has been one of the city's better-known landmarks since the Japanese colonial era. At its peak during the 1960s and 1970s, there were about 100 booths selling such popular Taiwanese snacks as glutinous rice dumplings, oyster omelettes (蚵仔煎), and meatballs.
Two devastating fires in 1993 and 1999, however, prompted the city government to ponder the future of the time-honored food market.
Cheng said the 1999 fire, which started in the kitchen of her booth, had cost her a lot, both financially and emotionally.
"I had to spend more than NT$3 million on renovations after putting up with being harassed by other vendors whose booths were damaged in the fire. The city government should at least have found me a suitable place to continue my business before it tore this place down," she said.
Chen Chen-sheng (
"It's because the city has set aside 25 booths for those who are interested in moving back. Also, we could continue our business at the nearby Yung Le Fabric Market (永樂市場) in the meantime. But, to be honest, it's a bad choice because the market is closed after 2:30pm and the vendors over there are very hostile to us," said Chen, 62, a second generation oyster omelette seller at the circle and one of the 25 vendors planning to move back.
Chen said that at first he opposed the revitalization project but eventually gave in.
"Reconstruction costs much more than remodeling. The land alone cost the city NT$450 million, not to mention the NT$160 million in reconstruction costs and the NT$50 million cost of compensation. I just hope that the revitalization project will work and bring back more customers," he said.
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