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The topic of revitalizing and redeveloping Downtown Kingston has been belabored, studied, and theorized in the public discourse for decades. Younger Jamaicans have only known of Downtown as it is now - a place in need of attention. In collaboration with the CB Facey Foundation, we created a series of videos to document visions of Downtown's pasts to create imaginaries of the future and inspire action in the now.
Like other historic town centers across the island, Downtown differs from newer urban areas in the physical form and historical context in which it was created. Through archival footage and interviews, we captured how unique physical, and socio-cultural elements made Downtown a bustling, thriving, and energetic place for many.
The look, feel, and flow of downtown Kingston is undeniably distinct. The English laid the city out in a rigorous grid with the North-South streets leading directly to the warehouses and ports at the Kingston Harbour, facilitating the plantation economy. Eventually this grid was reclaimed as crucial social infrastructure that facilitated the movement of people of goods and mixed use economies. As migration of rural peoples into the city intensified in the later decades the grid became the framework for their cultural practices and folk forms.
Generations of stories and nostalgia keep the cultural mosaic that is Downtown Kingston alive. As the elites took their wealth to suburbs in the Liguanea plains north of Downtown, those who were left managed and maintained the urban economy of the city. Musical forms developed prolifically downtown reflecting the way of life in the city but also the struggles of poverty and marginalization.
The music economy was supported by the framework of the grid that allowed for several players to be located in close proximity of each other, musicians, producers, studio spaces, distributors all congregated along Beat Street and developed the cultural economy of the nation.
The vision for our capital city has been shaped by its rich cultural legacy, and all those that stayed after the collapse of its urban economy to live, set up business and maintain the city. It's biggest strengths are its communities and its people, to see a full and equitable revival of Downtown means investing in and supporting them.Matthew McCarthy says it best."It means respect, it means understanding that there are so many different voices and individuals that have a stake in what we consider to be the culture of this area. As we go forward, we're going to have to make sure that there is representation on all fronts, and that people do feel like this is equally a space of business as it is a space of being able to live and enjoy what we have all built together."
This series was made possible in close collaboration with the CB Facey Foundation
