WALLS

Paradoxically the urban complexity of Kingston, in which movement from one point to another becomes an involved dance obtains for both sides of the divide, the poorer areas of Downtown and the wealthy areas of Uptown Kingston. Uptown and Downtown Kingston are mirror images of each other. For instance, landowners from both areas have capitalised on their land, creating yards (for the poor) or compounds (for the wealthy). These mercenary subdivisions have created a patchwork of domestic fortresses and an extraordinary network of non-connecting, narrow canyon-like paths.

Those of the poorer areas are lined by high corrugated iron fences, those of the wealthier areas are lined by concrete. Cars take up nearly all the available space in the resulting trench; drivers pay little or no heed to the army of commuting pedestrians at the wrong side of the puddle: school children, helpers, gardeners, farmers, beggars, churchgoers and nurses all negotiating the rough edges left to them.