Actuality and Remediation of Cannery Row

The positioning of Cannery Row is unique. More unique than most popular tourist destinations. Cannery Row is set on the north end of Monterey, away from the freeway and mass transit. "The Row", since it's original construction was for sardine canning, is situated right on the coast where the fisherman could unload their boats and have their precious cargo packaged immediatly. I see Cannery Row as an isolated part of Monterey that might be hidden if it weren't for the overwhelming amounts of signage pointing you to it.

The excess amount of signage for Cannery Row can be considered Hypermediated. Everytime I drive towards Cannery Row, I am barraged with signs with the words Cannery Row and an arrow pointing in the direction of the peninsula. Just looking down the street on Cannery Row shows me a good example of hypermedia. The signs of hotels and restaraunts hanging on all of the buildings with stop signs and parking meters lining the street. Radios playing in passing cars, inside shops and restaraunts. Some of the places using television to add to the already hypermediated street. There are, however, parts of the higly mediated row that are immediate in a sense. The cross walks can be seen as a media that is used for immediate purposes. The parking meters can be considered a media provided by the city, that serves an immediate monetary purpose.

The Cannery Row of today has become more involved with tourism and media than the age of the real canneries. The only artifacts left that are authentic to the original Cannery Row are a few foundations of old canneries that are now fenced off to the public. The buildings that once lined the street are still there, but have been renovated and stript clean of their originality. Doc's lab is the only building that I know of that has stayed in its original form since it was first built.