We tend to think that things have an inherent value, but it's not always so. When I was working at a motorcycle swap meet many years ago, at the end of the show I saw a dumpster full of gas tanks. I was boggled! Since they're generally the largest painted piece on a bike, they're usually treated carefully, so it was amazing to see so many in the garbage. On closer inspection, though, they _were_ all junk.
Have you seen old lenses, teleconverters, and lens cases in the $5 bin at the camera shop? They might be precision-made items, but nobody wants them anymore, so the shop is happy to get anything at all for them. Time marches on, and people want newer and better. Classic buildings, though, shouldn't be as disposable as that. Destroying old buildings is like destroying local history. Maybe that's why many North Americans have little sense of history. The older buildings are continually being replaced, so history is something you see in a book, not something you walk by on the way to work, or a place where you meet your friends. I'd be surprised if there are _any_ buildings in North America as old as 560 years that were built by the Europeans and their descendants. (The ancient pueblos and Mayan ruins aren't in cities, in daily use, like old buildings in Europe are.) Pat White
