Urbanization Notes #4
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Tag Archives: China
Urbanization Notes #1
Urbanization News: July 29
Pop Up to Permanent: The Globe and Mail features cities in North America and Europe that have embraced the idea of pop-up projects as a planning tool to rethink public spaces. The image above is from Times Square in New York, a “pilot” project that closed one of the city’s most chaotic streets to car traffic, a change that’s feeling pretty permanent these days.
HSR Crash Update: The New York Times reported that Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao admitted last week’s high-speed rail crash that killed 39 people was the result of a serious design flaw – not only did a signaling device malfunction after a lightning strike, but inadequately-trained workers also failed to notice.
Extortion, Violence Cripple Bus System: In more unfortunate transit news, TheCityFix reports that thousands of residents in Medellin, Colombia are without bus service due a driver strike to protest inadequate protection from extortionist gangs. A longtime bus driver was recently murdered after refusing to pay an extortion fee, setting off the strikes.
Master Plan in Abu Dhabi: The National outlines a new master plan for two suburban communities in Abu Dhabi, which would work to connect communities divided by a highway, promote walkability, and integrate them with the growing Abu Dhabi metro area. The revitalization would cover one of the oldest Emirati communities in the United Arab Emirates.
Green or Greenwashing?: The UK released a new national planning framework of its own that attempts to cut red tape, safeguard the environment, and prioritize sustainable development. Green groups, however, claim the lofty language obscures that the framework would actually jeopardize environmental protection and make carbon-intensive development projects easier.
Dealing With Density 1: Last week we featured a story about public housing in Hong Kong – this week the Wall Street Journal offers a personal view into the crisis of overcrowding, the trend of subdividing already small apartments, and the challenge of providing housing in the city of seven million.
Dealing With Density 2: While in Hong Kong more people are fitting into smaller spaces, the Guardian UK reports on Moscow’s controversial plan to double the city’s size to relieve crippling congestion – a plan that would destroy forests, summer homes, and relocate hundreds of thousands of rural residents. Moscow’s population has grown by 200,000 people per year since 2006.
Nixed Signals: The Times of India reports that Gandhinagar, the only city in the state of Gujarat that has no traffic lights or stop signs (but lots of roundabouts), is getting its first traffic booth as the number of cars on the road has grown unmanageable.
Urbanization News: July 24
“1 Million Dead in 30 Seconds”: That’s the appropriately jarring title of an article by Claire Berlinski in the Summer volume of City Journal, about the increasing risk of earthquakes for massive destruction as cities grow larger. It’s really an excellent piece that speaks to wealth, risk, and how this plays out in the human costs of a natural disaster: “Mother Nature doesn’t have it in for the poor. Rather, earthquakes come to our attention only when they are disasters, and they are disasters only when they strike dense urban areas full of badly made buildings.” The image above is an earthquake vulnerability map made by Benjamin D. Hennig at the University of Sheffield.
Flood Blame Game: Massive flooding in Lagos, Nigeria caused not only widespread damage but also accusations that President Goodluck Jonathan is insensitive to disaster victims for failing to visit the state after the destruction. The federal government shot back that the flood was the result of poor planning by a local government that allowed housing and road construction in drainage areas vulnerable to flooding. The housing problem that in part caused irresponsible building in the first place is now worsened by the loss of so many homes in the flood.
India in Numbers: The Wall Street Journal reported on India’s Census numbers, which revealed that the pace of urbanization is speeding up – the growth rate for urban areas over the last decade was about 32%, making the 12% rise in rural growth pale in comparison. Interestingly, the same WSJ India blog reported back in April about how the population in Central Delhi actually fell by 10% in the same time span – mostly due to massive slum clearance. Could that trend be reversed? Last week a panel of private sector, government and academic minds convened a panel in Mumbai moderated by Mint with a bold premise: “The country must stop looking at slums as a problem.” The post has an abbreviated transcript with some interesting thoughts about planning, urbanization, and the value of informal settlements in India.
This Week in Waste: With the heatwave it was unfortunate timing that a fire in a Manhattan wastewater treatment plant sent 200 million gallons of untreated sewage into the Hudson river last week – it not only smelled terrible but also brought to light an aging system that’s woefully under capacity especially as more people move to New York. On a brighter note, this NY Times post highlights how cities in the Western U.S. facing water shortfalls are finding opportunities in treated wastewater for irrigation instead of simply discharging it into waterways.
Sea Span: The longest sea bridge in the world opened last week in Qingdao, China. Over 26 miles (42 km) long, the Jiazhou Bay Bridge links more modern development on one side of the bay with the older government and banking center on the other side.
Public Housing in Hong Kong: Asia Sentinel report Alice Poon was interviewed by Shanghai’s Dong Fang Daily Shanghai Review of Books about her recent work, Land and the Ruling Class in Hong Kong. The interview offers interesting insights into the history of public housing and real estate development in Hong Kong, and cultural perceptions of property rights. The photos below are by photographer Michael Wolf – check out his project to photograph residents in Hong Kong’s oldest public housing estate here, where he photographed 100 rooms, each 100 square feet in size.
Armchair Engagement: Yuri Artibise’s Yurbanism blog highlighted a new tool that might just bring more people into the process of planning our cities without scheduling more public meetings. PlaceSpeak is being tested in Canada and would offer residents a way to voice their opinions about local issues using an online platform. Check it out and browse some issues in Vancouver, and what local residents have to say about them, here.
Want to take an urban land use class?: The World Bank Institute is offering a seven-week e-learning course called “Sustainable Urban Land Use Planning” starting on September 1st. The cost is $600 – registration is open until August 11.
Urbanization News: July 15
That snazzy promo video is for this week’s featured urban happening, “The Just City: A Ford Forum on Metropolitan Opportunity” held in New York yesterday. Sponsored by the Ford Foundation, it brought together “Civic leaders and policymakers, urban designers and entrepreneurs [to] explore how fairness, opportunity and equity can serve as the defining features of this new era of urbanization.” NYU-Wagner adjunct planning prof Solomon Greene, also a fellow at the Open Society Foundations, offers some remarks on Bruce Katz‘s talk in this video. The lineup was an impressive one of thinkers and practitioners doing visionary work in their metropolitan area.
And our picks of the week’s news on cities and urbanization:
This Week in Waste: A pair of articles discusses innovative strategies for what to do with waste as cities grow. This article from PRI features a hydroponic farm in a Chinese lake that gets fertilizer for its leafy greens from sewage dumped in the water from the city of Kunming (photo below, courtesy of PRI). This dispatch from India via Live Mint critiques Delhi’s privatization of waste hauling, especially where Pune offers an example of a rapidly urbanizing city implementing a zero-waste strategy that’s working both for people who sustain their livelihoods from the waste stream and for the environment too.
My city’s modal split is better than yours: The Institute for Transportation and Development Policy opened up nominations for the 2012 Sustainable Transport Award – hurry up and nominate the city where you love to commute! Right now you’re up against Seville, Minneapolis, Cape Town and a few others – Guangzhou won last year, so you won’t have to compete with their awesome BRT and bike share.
“They put a bullet through the train”: In last week’s news we reported that donors had pledged big bucks for inter-city transportation infrastructure in Brazil in anticipation of the 2014 World Cup. Long a transport investment darling of the donor community, Brazil might not be quite as sexy as previously thought – Reuters reports that an auction that opened up this week for bids to build a bullet train between Rio and Sao Paulo (this one a major project for the 2016 Olympics) failed to attract a single bid.
The “Forgotten Front”: This Big City reports on the desperate situation of water in Afghanistan – being in turmoil for decades, infrastructure and institutions needed for a reliable and safe water supply have suffered greatly. “Around 73 percent of the population relies on improvised and inadequate facilities to supply water, while water sources are becoming increasingly polluted and overexploited in places like Kabul.” Find out more in this report from the Centre for Policy and Human Development at Kabul University (photo of the Kabul River below courtesy of IRIN, see a slideshow here). And just in case you were scratching your head too, the U.S. alone has spent about $19 billion just in development aid in Afghanistan since the war effort started.
Everyone should count: Cities Alliance released a new report this week, “The Urbanisation of Displaced People.” It examines how conflicts and wars lead to a unique form of rapid urbanization as people flee their homes and seek refuge in cities – because many refugees and displaced people end up as permanent residents, the report makes a case for planners and development practitioners to account for these populations in plans and programs.
A critique of Ed Glaeser?!?: James Howard Kunstler, in his witty weekly “KunstlerCast” podcast, critiques Ed Glaeser’s ideas on urbanism. He sees Glaeser’s vision in his lauded book Triumph of the City as backward-looking and too sweet on skyscrapers.
Urbanization News: July 8
Rankled: This week’s featured news story is from Polis, which posted an excellent critical piece about city rankings:
“The regurgitated notion that New York, London, and Tokyo sit comfortably at the peak of the “global city” hierarchy has little bearing on the activities of the street cleaners, shop owners, artists, and residents who populate these places. Or does it?”
The post raises that questions not only the metrics used to rate “top” cities, but also mentions recent research on how cities deemed to be the best can also hurt other cities by drawing away businesses and workers, and “world-class” cities also tend to have higher degrees of inequities.
Melissa has written about and critiqued city indices in past posts too, check them out here and here.
Urban Evolution from Revolution: Der Spiegel describes how while the future of the Yemeni capital hangs in the balance, what started as a sit-in has evolved into a 3-4,000 organized tent city.
New to the Tube: The Economist reports on the London Tube‘s new map that’s supposed to be more geographically accurate – but will it be easier to use? The article gives a nod to NYU-Wagner professor Zhan Guo’s recent paper that made headlines last month in the UK from showing that the (now) old map tricked 30% of passengers into taking longer trips than they needed to. If you’re in London, let us know if the new, squigglier map has made your commute any faster.
2014 Transport Goooools: TheCityFix reports that the Inter-American Development Bank and other donors are making huge investments in Brazil’s infrastructure, especially the transport sector, in advance of the 2014 World Cup.
Building Binge?: As Chinese cities like Wuhan are racing to developing new infrastructure, the New York Times reports new worries about understated risk of loans to local governments.
Two Wheels Good, Two Wheels Bad: This Big City proposes that better bike networks are a positive feedback for other qualities that make for more socially sustainable cities. With that in mind it’s sad to hear local media reporting from Toronto that “The war is over, the car has won.” That’s true in another sense, according to the New York Times’ Economix blog, which speaks to the huge direct subsidies and indirect social costs cars pose on cities, which trump the benefits cities receive from cycling.
A European Ghost Town In China?
Recent articles from CNN to the India Times have reported on ghost town cities popping up all over China built in the image of western counterparts. Places like Thames Town outside of Shanghai have been built in the replication of western style cities. Thames town
Thames Town - Complete with British Guards
looks straight out of the United Kingdom (although reports say it was built on an Austrian design aesthetic) complete with churches, town squares and those iconic red telephone booths. An even more interesting point is that Thames town is practically disserted. Most news from China on the real estate market contains statements on how robust and healthy the housing market is, and how Chinese cities are growing at enormous speeds. Areas of Shanghai, Beijing and Hong Kong have real estate prices that rival those of the Western World; so this would appear true. But is China’s real estate bubble about to burst?
Photo credit: Flickr user triplefivechina
Photo credit: Flickr user triplefivechina
Reports and experts state that the Chinese housing market could be over-valued by a whopping 70%, and that millions of new homes go under used and deserted. However I think that this is an overstatement. There are a number of different political and economic mechanisms that are working within China that require the Chinese government to making such an aggressive move towards “oversupplying housing”. The first and most prominent trend today is the massive amount of migration occurring within the nation. Within the next 20 years it is estimated that an additional 200-250 Chinese workers will move to the City from rural areas in search of jobs. This means that China will have to have to create a large amount of cities and housing in an extremely short amount of time. The second trend is an additional 100 million Chinese workers are expected to escalate the capitalistic ladder out of poverty and into middleclass-dom during this time– leaving existing cities with a large amount of demand for better accommodations. The third and most unique factor is how the Chinese government enforces its living and residential permit system known as Hukou (pronounced like who-cow). The Hukou system is a regulatory system that designates where a person/household may reside by geographic area. For instance a farmer from the country side would have to obtain a Hukou city permit in order to legally move into a city to find work. Think of it as a quota immigration system in between two countries, western and eastern China and that will give you some idea of how it works. In an attempt to control migration the Hukou system (while possibly ineffective – just like other quota systems) could be used to steer workers into these smaller newer cities being built and take some of the mass migration pressures away from the larger cities that are overcrowded.
Regardless of the current conditions the government has committed itself to creating 20 cities a year for the next 20 years. The strong intervention approach with the housing market and urban growth that the Chinese government has taken is unlike anything the world has ever seen. It will be fascinating to see how it will play out.
-Adam
Shenzhen: The “Instant City”
We will be starting a new monthly profile of cities around the world that have experienced unprecedented growth. Hopefully this will give insight into some of the massive challenges that planners and governments face in accommodating this growth and what some of these plans (or lack thereof) have produced.
Shenzhen
This month we will take a look at Shenzhen, China. Known as the “instant city”, Shenzhen is a major urban area of almost 10 million people in China’s Guangdong Province, situated immediately north of Hong Kong. Owing to China’s economic liberalization, the area became China’s first – and arguably most successful – Special Economic Zone. Since the establishment of the Special Economic Zone in the late 1970’s, Shenzhen has seen unprecedented growth from a village of 30,000 to a city of over 325 times that.
Shenzhen in 1970
Shenzhen Today
The small fishing village of Shenzhen was singled out in the 1979 to be one of the first Special Economic Zones (SEZ) under the leadership of Deng Xiaoping, the “father of modern China”. Since Shenzhen is so close to the then rapidly growing Hong Kong, the SEZ was meant to be an experimental ground for development. The idea was that Shenzhen would be able to provide cheaper labor and land that could accommodate the private sector looking to expand their Hong Kong operations. This concept proved extremely successful. Through strong government planning and infrastructural development Shenzhen saw an average annual population growth around 30% for the next 3 decades. This was unequalled almost anywhere in the world. In 2007, it had a GDP of almost $100 billion dollars, ranking it fourth among all Chinese cities, and Shenzhen’s GDP per capita surpassed $10,000, the first Chinese city to do so. Shenzhen is also known as one of the cleanest large Chinese cities with over 50% of streets lined with trees and large parks and green spaces available to its residents.
However for a city that experienced the type of rapid growth, it was very fortunate to have had forward thinking city officials and planners to help manage its success. Shenzhen officials remarkably were able to implement a total of three master plans within the span of 25 years; each adding to the fuel and direction of growth.
Shenzhen's Urban Growth Boundary
The first master plan of 1986 put in six “cluster cities” that concentrated growth and infrastructure along three highways. In the ten years to follow this, unprecedented growth and lack of zoning controls lead to major urban sprawl in Shenzhen. By 1996, the urban sprawl that had started only 17 years previously covered over 645 sq. kilometers of land, the same size as 11 islands of Manhattan. Shenzhen was slowly running out of land and most of the structures being built were low-density manufacturing and housing units. City planners were also concerned about livability and taking a page from more developed nations, created a new 1000 sq. kilometer growth boundary; the first of its kind in China. “Periphery growth clusters” were also implemented around the existing six “cluster cities” to encourage growth and greater density while even more infrastructure, highways and a massive subway system began construction.
Shenzhen's First Master Plan of 1986
Shenzhen's Second Master Plan of 1996
By the mid 2000’s when a third master plan was being drawn up; planners faced another dilemma entirely. The amount of space that could actually be used for development was dwindling, and quickly. Only about 100 sq. kilometers of legally developable land was left, and officials feared that without more space that the economic engine of Shenzhen would come to a halt. Officials were faced with a hard choice. Instead of diminishing the green growth boundary, Chinese officials designated more than 200 square kilometers of occupied land as “urban regeneration areas”. The idea was to clear dilapidated low-density buildings and properties to build newer, higher density facilities. The government opted to buy back occupied land from private stakeholders and would then build new facilities themselves or give large plots back to developers. This plan was reinforced by stricter building codes that encouraged higher density industries and residential buildings. This tactic proved to be successful; Shenzhen has added almost 3 million people since the last master plan was put in place.
Shenzhen's Third Master Plan of 2005
This unprecedented growth however did not come without its consequences. Besides the ever present problems of pollution and traffic that come with large cities; Shenzhen had a massive housing problem. Chinese “urban villages” or slums popped up illegally almost overnight on the designated growth boundaries and open spaces. Workers’ conditions and quality of life for the millions of migrants were often quite appalling with little in the way of government intervention. The problems that these workers faced is beyond the scope of this post but the immense dilemma of how to deal with millions of migrants moving into a city within such a short time categorizes many of the toughest problems that these mega-cities face. Even thought there are many problems that Shenzhen still faces, it will forever be in the history books as a city that experienced an unprecedented rapid and sustained growth rate for over three decades.
-Adam
Shenzhen's Lychee Park
Urbanization News June 17
ECA International, the world’s leader in the development and provision of solutions for the management and assignment of employees, around the world just release its international cost of living survey. There were a few notable results, especially in Australia as Sydney rose from the 29th to 16th most expensive city and all major Australian cities rose up the ranking into the top 30. The most expensive city in the world remains Tokyo, Japan.
Top Ten most Expensive Cities in the World:
2011 rank |
Location |
Country |
2010 rank |
|---|---|---|---|
|
1
|
Tokyo
|
Japan
|
1
|
|
2
|
Oslo
|
Norway
|
2
|
|
3
|
Nagoya
|
Japan
|
4
|
|
4
|
Stavanger
|
Norway
|
6
|
|
5
|
Yokohama
|
Japan
|
5
|
|
6
|
Zurich
|
Switzerland
|
10
|
|
7
|
Luanda
|
Angola
|
3
|
|
8
|
Geneva
|
Switzerland
|
9
|
|
9
|
Kobe
|
Japan
|
7
|
|
10
|
Bern
|
Switzerland
|
11
|
Did you know that track trespassing is the largest cause of unnatural deaths in Mumbai? In 2009 about 10 people per day died by being hit as they crossed the tracks. To curb these dangerous, but often necessary treks across Mumbai’s train tracks an unorthodox experiment has been taking place as official made slight changes to the areas near the tracks with India’s new Train Safety Campaign:
On the surface, the experiment involves small, odd changes. Certain railway ties have been painted bright yellow; a new kind of signboard has been installed near the tracks; engine drivers have modified the way they hoot their warning whistles. This modest tinkering has had dramatic results. In the six months before the experiment went live in December 2009, Wadala had recorded 23 track-crossing deaths, said M. C. Chauhan, a manager with the Central Railway’s Mumbai division. Between January and June 2010, that number had dropped to nine; in the next eight months, up until February 2011, only one death was registered. Read more from the Boston Globe.
High-Speed Trains in China to Run Slower I know many transportation junkies that are excited about the opening of the Beijing-Shanghai bullet train this summer, hopefully they will not be too disappointed by this weeks announcement that it will be running slower than expected:
China’s troubled Railway Ministry on Monday lowered the top operating speed for its flagship Beijing-to-Shanghai bullet train, which is set to open later this month, scaling down what was supposed to be a pinnacle of a transformed rail system that has become one of the country’s proudest and most ambitious domestic initiatives. The new line, once set to run at up to 236 miles per hour, will instead run trains at 186 and 155 miles per hour, the ministry announced. Read more from the New York Times.
Shanghai Demolishes Another Urban Village
I discovered last week that an urban village I visited about a year ago in Shanghai is in the process of being demolished. Although this is all to common in China, this case was especially disheartening because this village housed the architectural studio of YangXu. In the past few years YangXu has developed some innovated designs for integrating the current urban villages into their rapidly urbanization surroundings.
As the names suggests, Urban Villages were once rural villages that have been swallowed by China’s ever expanding cities. YangXu describes this phenomena:
Driven by the rapid urbanization process in Shanghai, the suburban villages situated in outer-beltways are being swallowed into the “Urban Villages”. The original villagers who lost their fields uncomfortably became the “new citizens”; the defeated villages formed slums, enclosing the city as an “enclave” on the urban periphery. These “Urban Villages” have become a common phenomenon under the process of Chinese urbanization, leading to continual demolition rather than resolution.
Unfortunately demolition seems to be the inevitable fate of so many of these communities in China’s cities. According to YangXu, his former Urban Village was demolished as part of an “ongoing clearance of the villages” as there are plans to covert the land to residential and commercial leasehold of properties. Since the government of Shanghai, technically owns all of the land, the government certainly stands to profit from such endeavors. However where the many relocated residents will now live remains unanswered.
YangXu’s design solutions, pictured above, maintain the existing buildings and build new structures on top of them instead of demolishing the existing urban fabric. Unfortunately though it does not seem likely that these plans will be realized in the near future, as demolition in order to build new towers is certainly more profitable for China’s local governments.
Below is a series of photos of YangXu’s from studio, his work and the urban village that once existed.
- Melissa
Inside YangXu’s studio. More pictures can be found on his website.
YangXu’s pilot project of “Reconstruction and Improvement on Urban Periphery” where he asks:
- The original village is endowed with the charm of the traditional framework. Is it possible that these Urban Villages can be preserved and reformed as part of community reconstruction, thereby confronting the demolition of the urbanization process?
- Urbanization or modernization should maintain a sense of pluralism, will the reconstruction of “Urban Villages” provide an approach in contrast to the downtown area of Consumerism or Epicurean
- Reconstructions connotes some aspects of “Cultural Self-Consciousness” as part of modernization, can we really reform ourselves through it?
A young resident, standing next to an electrified fence that separates her urban village from the condominium project next door.
Illegal access to electricity and other utilities is very common in this neighborhood.
A neighbor selling fresh meat and fish.
A vegetable vendor.
A house that appears to have been part of the original, rural village.
Photo Credits: Melissa Reese
