[Source]
Regarding the hippodrome, the leaked correspondence shows that the culture ministry agreed to “the reintegration of the whole southern section of the ruins into the structure intended to be built by keeping it in situ, and the dismantling and re-installation of the central course and northern sections.â€
Layoun vociferously defended his decision when he spoke to Al-Akhbar.
“What we did is an important achievement. It corrects the mistake by Solidere, which deceived property owners by not informing them that there were archaeological finds before buying the property,†he said. [Link]
I am not surprised to read this one single bit. In fact, I am a bit happy that they will actually preserve the site by “integrating” it into an upmarket commercial development, because I don’t expect better from this government or any other one. When you hear about filling up an archaeological site with sewers in Beirut in order to build a monument on top, you should not be shocked to hear this.
well i understand your situation, i get why you’re not shocked… but we can’t just let this happen to such an important site… we can all not be shocked and smile saying ok… we didn’t expect much in the first place, or we can do something about it…
well i hope you become an active member on this fb page http://www.facebook.com/PhonecianPortBeirut
Sorry, I understand where you’re coming from, and preserving your heritage, but Lebanon is a very small country, whereever you dig in Lebanon you’re bound to find some artefact or other. Should we preserve the entire country, and live where?
there are many significant sites like the castles in Tripoli or Jbeil or the temples of Baalbeck, the sea castle in Saida, the ruins in Tyre, yes, I’m all for preserving the entire site as it is, however, you cant expect to save every single site you come accross.
This is a big deal ‘exile’.Your country and the space entitled to everybody is being sold, and built on, and what do we get? a small cubical so we can stare face down at the archeological site. They might as well just take it all out. theyre building on top of a public space. Its a space for the public and not the private sectors. If anything this project doesnt have to be a restoration but at least a public space to exist in the same location. Beirut has almost no public beach space with the exception of ramlet el bayda and the sewer waters after ouzai. Now we are heading in the same direction with the inland spaces.
well as an archaeologist i would love that but i dont want to preserve everything we excavate! Somethings are just enough studied and documented but this is a roman hippodrome and the port is unique! It’s not like we have 20 phoenician ports in what was phoenicia…
as an archaeologist do you also have to start all your sentences with “well” ?
haha maybe! how is this relevant now? 😀
I have seen the same technique done in Rome. Is the whole propaganda against the project because it is adjacent to Saad Hariri’s mansion and he wants to keep the view?
personally i am against the integration because we’re talking about a hippodrome which is originally an open space, and the plan is to integrate part of it and the other part will remain in-situ… now as for the phoenician port in venus projects, well that one can be integrated because it can all fit inside the building, although i would prefer it stays an open space, but sometimes it can work, other times i cannot. if you visit the museum in st george (downtown beirut) you would see that everything was kept underground in a “fair” way… so it won’t be fair to do the same for a hippodrome or a temple…