The Ghostly Landscapes

In the city of San Fernando new buildings are being erected due to demand by consumers for more. Malls, banks and structures for commerce are now reigning in the new urban feel and is advertising the developments of the future. Then there is the everyday spaces that were in full use just a few years ago but now are ghostly, overgrown by creepers and show what once was. 

Down town San Fernando: 09/04/2013

This type of landscape form an integral part of the "urban experience". It gives commuters a feeling of the past which as seen in the picture, which is now covered by a "make shift" future one that is emerging and using the old to create the new.

The Theory

According to (Hubbard 2006) different groups of people tent to experience the urban in various ways. People get attached to certain urban landscapes such as the one they see everyday, roles that sense and body play in our perceptions and rhythms of the public place.

Now the human experience in the city brings about a field of study called humanistic geography. It is more concerned with the value that people give places and landscapes within societies and culture. (Meinig 1979) talks about finding a richness and value in even the most mundane landscapes. This is also seen when (Meinig 1979):

"....Such common workaday landscape has very little to do with the skilled work of landscape architects, but it has a great deal to say about the United States as a country and Americans as a people."

There is a lot of history behind mundane landscapes. For example in East London the landscape of the past show the ghosts of the working class (Edensor 2008) where there are gaps of present day landscapes where it was once vibrant.  This is also seen in the Trinidad express newspaper which talks about the Wharf in San Fernando and the colourful history of the abandoned old jetty 

http://www.trinidadexpress.com/news/Colourful_history_of_Sando_wharf-198714771.html

The Video

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BfdyLtjgFL8

Know you guys are surely gonna enjoy this....so nostalgic.

References

Edensor T.(2008). Mundane hauntings: commuting through the phantasmagoric working-class spaces of Manchester England. Cultural Geographies 15(3): 313-33.

Hubbard P. (2006). City. Abingdon: Routledge.

Meinig D.W.(1979). The interpretations of ordinary landscapes : Geographical essays. New York: Oxford University Press.