To the untrained eye, you could imagine perhaps two manmade lakes in a meadow, a scenic meadow that highway-goers regularly stop at to picnic. Perhaps a peaceful meadow of prancing deer in a Disney-like musical number. But the reality is far from this idealistic and gushy interpretation. Every acre of that nice flat plain might someday become the next craze in shopping or real estate. I’m sorry deer, but you’ll have to move out.
I’ve always been accustomed to construction. Growing up not thirty minutes away from Miami, I’ve always seen construction. So much so that even after it finished, it didn’t feel the same. Every time I would pass a newly constructed area, it would feel simply out of place. The dirt piles and sand piles and manmade lakes and forklifts and bulldozers, they were old friends, whether or not they improved my life or not. Even when I moved to study in Miami, the same construction greeted me on the highways. Merely search “miami construction” on Google.com and the map of Miami is filled with red dots, each a construction site or company. Even though the construction market is slowly rebounding from its low days, construction is so deeply engraved into Miami that it has become the blood of Miami.
Miami is an incomplete city. We are constantly revamping and remodeling ourselves in appearances, including building the new Brickell CitiCentre complex in Miami and the two new mega-casinos in downtown Miami. Our constant state of flux has deemed us without character, a theme that author Gregory Bush has expounded upon in his article “‘Playground of the USA:’ Miami and the Promotion of Spectacle”. What held true then holds true now. We have, as a community, empty lots waiting to become apartments and ever expanding highways and casinos to call home. We will never complete our city.
Original photo:
http://merrick.library.miami.edu/u?/asm0530,1481
For more information:
http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/10/07/2443961_p2/with-more-building-underway-miamis.html
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