New York
New York's Chinatown may be the largest in the United States, but it has also often borne an unflattering title: the dirtiest and the most chaotic.
From San Francisco to Washington, smaller Chinatowns have traditional pagoda gates leading to shops clustered along tidy streets. A sense of tradition and order prevails.
In New York, Chinatown has usually been marked more by the clutter of awnings, litter and a fishy stink that is distinct even on freezing winter days. During summer there are the additional joys of rats and cockroaches scurrying between rubbish bags and gutters.
The scene has deterred tourists and shamed locals. In a survey after the September 11 attacks to determine Chinatown's rebuilding needs, residents and businesses listed sanitation as a top concern.
The situation has improved in the past 18 months thanks to a team of two dozen cleaners who wear yellow jackets and wield brooms. So far they have collected more than 2,700 tonnes of litter, on top of rubbish collected by the city's regular sanitation workers. But the long-term existence of the 'yellow jackets' is in question.
The team was hired by the Chinatown Partnership Local Development Corporation, an organisation formed in 2004 to help Chinatown, which is close to Ground Zero, recover from September 11. But a US$7 million fund from the state and city governments will support the project for four years at most. If the community cannot work out a sustainable plan, Chinatown is at risk of going backwards - and failing to change its rubbish-dump image.