Construction...

...is common in Our Fair City.  Many cities here have large numbers of cranes visible on the horizon.  As the population moved from rural to urban locations housing is an immediate issue.  Some of the housing is very different from what we see in most places in the US.  

A friend we met a month ago lives in a 210 square foot two room apartment with her husband, child, and husband's parents. She and her husband both work to make ends meet, and her in-laws work to raise her son. This is typical for many.

The buildings shown here are just a few blocks from my home and are a few step up the ladder from the housing I just described.  We have villages nearby where individual units do not have any kind of modern facility, but many of the local villages have been razed to help move people into apartments.  Apartments are the policy - probably because they cost less to implement than houses for each family.  These two buildings are part of a set of 6-20 in the development.  A complex of this size going up all at once is common.

Housing is one of the things many here  have in common with our pioneer ancestors.