Lion on the loose
No ship can be expected to reach its destination safely if it is not well-manned. What has already been and is today being built in Jerusalem assures that the younger generations will pay a heavy price as the captain of this ship – Moshe Lion, a layman, an accountant and economist, Jerusalem’s de-facto Chief Urban Designer, is incompetent.
While ignorant power can be found in every aspect of our society, the belief of politicians that once elected they have the power in their hands and may do pretty much what they want is one of the most dangerous.
As anyone living in Jerusalem can testify, the city has been undergoing rapid gargantuan changes unprecedented in its long history at staggering public cost. The danger hanging over change at this scale is extremely great as it tends to produce disorder and chaos by giving any number of ignorant men whose notions of what is good are of a low and brutal sort.
The security of our natural and built historic heritage is dependent on the preservation of order and especially on controls related to the accumulation of wealth. Endeavors toward a better life depends mainly on man’s selfless industry and public duty, not on private advantage.
Over the last several years Moshe Lion has been intent on making of sacred and historic Jerusalem a competitor of Israel’s financial hub -Tel-Aviv, the towering skyscrapers at the Western entrance to the city, announcing the major change to Jerusalem’s character that he has imposed. Building incessantly, all timed to be completed before the next mayoral elections in 2029.
Lacking a strategic vision and piecemeal, Lion has forfeited professional advice, actively encouraging real-estate developers’ speculative building to govern Jerusalem’s urban future with disastrous results. The visual basin of the Old City has been impacted by the dozens of towers surrounding it. Jaffa Road has become a hodgepodge of towers adjoining historic 2-3 story buildings, just two of hundreds of examples covering the entire city.
Beneficiaries of this orgy of pig-like capitalism are not just the politicians. Architects, engineers, builders, bureaucrats and project managers, servants of this diseased social order, have all been taking their share of the pie.
Needless to say, Jerusalem isn’t alone. Over the last generation, every major city in Israel has been subject to urban anarchy.
The wrong-doing of those who lived before us and the children that come after us will be sufferers of the same causes.
Gerard Heumann – Architect and Urban Designer, Jerusalem
