Beijing's Disappearing Hutong

Today's NYT has an article about how Beijing's hutong, the vibrant alleyway communities so central to city life over the centuries, are in danger from the massive building projects tied to the 2008 Olympics. I wrote a bit about the hutong last month when I was in Beijing. It seems from all that I saw that the Olympics are merely going to exacerbate a problem that was happening anyway -- the hutong were fast disappearing as the result of the city's almost unfathomable growth. Still, for all that the Olympics will bring to Beijing, the acceleration of such a lively and emblematic world is tragic.