Countless "hutong, " as Beijing's traditional courtyard housing is called, have been knocked down and replaced by skyscrapers, shopping malls and apartment buildings.
Beijing's planners say that the hutong neighbourhoods are too dilapidated to renew and too narrow to be modernised with gas, water and sewerage systems.
Lined with family-owned shops and siheyuan (traditional courtyard homes), each hutong illustrates a way of life that has endured in Beijing for eight centuries.