The consultations took a long time, and inevitably involved demolishing minor historic buildings. The UK devotes a lot of effort to preservation where China devotes almost none. The price of cities popping up like desert flowers is the sweeping away of entire villages of traditional buildings.
I've been to a lot of National Trust and English Heritage houses. The country is lousy with them. I feel sure one or two can be parted with. This isn't America where anything over 100 years is automatically some kind of national monument. We sold them London Bridge, can't we offload a Little Pifflington Stately Home or two?
