Dominic Johnson-Hill, a British entrepreneur who spent nine years living in the Drum and Bell neighborhood, says the hutongs "are kind of the living museums of China, or Beijing at least."
"If you go to the Forbidden City it feels quite empty, as do a lot of cultural spots. But when you go to a hutong, you feel like you are in some of the best surviving parts of Beijing," Johnson-Hill says.
The Drum and Bell towers were first built in 1272 to announce the time, and at various points in history, the square served as a lively marketplace. Today, it is different.
A previous plan in 2009 to demolish the courtyard houses and build an underground mall was shelved after opposition from civic groups and some residents.
The Dongcheng District government says the new plan is about preserving history. It says it will restore the square "to its original appearance" by using maps of the Emperor Qianlong period (1736-1795) in the Qing Dynasty and other unspecified periods, though they are still working out designs and details are vague. Residents, however, were given notice to move in December.
The oldest houses to be demolished date from the Republic of China (1911-1949), but most were either renovated or rebuilt after the 1970s, says Liu Jingdi, who works for the Dongcheng District Historical Appearance Protection Office.
These houses are of "no historical value. There is absolutely no cultural heritage in the 4,700-square-meter area" to be demolished, Liu says.
The neighborhood's average living space per household is just 20 square meters and is rife with fire hazards, officials say. Many houses are made of wood, and the three-meter-wide hutongs are too narrow for fire trucks to navigate.
Those displaced will be relocated to bigger apartments farther from the city center. Residents of illegally added second and third stories won't be compensated, says Li Guanghui, deputy chief of Dongcheng housing administration.
Officials say the project will raise residents' living standards and safeguard the area's historical appearance. Heritage experts disagree, saying the existing homes should be renovated, not destroyed.
"We respect this place because it has so many histories, so many stories, so many imaginations," says He from the Beijing Cultural Heritage Protection Center. "They think this is a dilapidated place, the messiest place of Beijing. They think Beijing should be big, sparkling and new."
One hutong community south of the Forbidden City and Tian'anmen Square was bulldozed to make way for new shops modeled on old architecture, rebuilt in 2008 with new materials rather than reusing what was there before. It is now filled with Chinese and Western brand stores.
Dongcheng officials say the Drum and Bell square won't become a commercial street and that the surrounding area will remain residential. But those in the immediate vicinity will have to leave.
Many aren't sorry, and are looking forward to newer and bigger houses.
"I wanted to move 30 years ago," says one woman, who would only give her surname, Wang.
Liu Fengying, 64, is more wistful. Liu, who remembers three earlier generations of her family living in the neighborhood, hosted visitors while wearing a winter coat and sitting on a bed that took up about half of one of her two drafty rooms. A washing line was strung across the room, and a calendar with a drawing of a young Mao Zedong hung on the wall.
"I'm not willing to leave," she says. "But if the state needs this land, then we have no choice. They will give us a bigger house, but it's just a little far out."
Johnson-Hill, the British entrepreneur, says he chose to live in a hutong because he wanted to bring up his children in a community, rather than in neighborhoods where "people live a meter apart but don't even know each other." His family lived on a courtyard with four Chinese families.
"Those families are now like family to us. Our children would come home and would go to our neighbors' home before they came to our home," he says. "The best days of my life have been spent living on hutongs."
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