#04 soft urban structure - Mixed low-rise residential areas - Smooth accesses - urban zombies - normal predicaments of human divinity - suburban civilizations - corrosive effe cts on democratic life - spatial patterns of social life - neglected developments and missed pot entials - Fake Items - Chinese Counterfeit Bombs

This issue of Monu is the biggest yet – in many ways. We received an unprecedented number of contributions reflected in a denser layout and a nevertheless new page-count record. The readership of Monu-especially the online ver- sion seems to be growing fast and on all continents and regions of the world. A lot of good news for a magazine that started out as an experimental project.

From TOKYO to LOCKHART TEXAS, from suburbs and infor- mal settlements to the biggest representational buildings in capital cities, from HELSINKI to JERUSALEM, this issue offers a dazzling journey around the world to forms and episodes of urban life that have one thing in common: they lead a precarious existence, in our perceptions and in rec- ognition of what is viable ‘urban’ life or - more drasti- cally - are actually threatened in their existence. It is not only le Corbusiers famous “the eyes that cannot see” or don’t want to see, but sometimes also that which the eyes do not want to see (any longer). However as many of the contributions in this issue show clearly most of the time both of those symptoms of denying urbanism are happening simultaneously and are faces of the same coin.

Language: English