The Landscape Urbanism - Assignment Example

The landscape urbanism: Shenzhen growth pattern, planning for ecological infrastructure as a tool for sustainable growth Introduction The city of Shenzhen is located between southeast of the mainland China and northern edge of Hong Kong. Its total land area is 2000 km2. The city has about 230 km coastline (Appadurai, 2010). The development of the city started when a socialist leader Deng Xiaoping established the first economic zone as part of his opening policy in 1979. From the year 1980 to 2001, the city’s GDP increased by 724 times and the annual growth rate is 38.4%. The result of this is the booming population and economic development. Shenzhen has made remarkable achievement on rapid economic development. This was coupled with rapid urbanization that increased the role of the city and brought conflicts between resource and environment. However, rapid urbanization has drastically changed the city landscape. Through deforestation and reclamation, the once mountainous to sea pattern of the city no longer exist. The once highly agricultural landscape is replaced by flat cityscape in downtown areas. The regional setting of the city in the Pearl River delta in China is the center for the rapid development. The political sphere of interest concerns the role of the elite in planning a new city. The internationalization idea in the city and production of the landscapes reflecting the globalization effect of the urban elite and invoke transition of the social formation. The construction of Culture entities is fore grounded in the new cities of China. This exemplifies and shifts ideology about accepted culture symbolism. The new city designs are a blend of the post-modern modernism and tradition Chinese design style. The papers examine the rapid urbanization of the Shenzhen city, the production of the new landscape through the planning and design of the Shenzhen new city. It also highlights on the application of ecological infrastructure as a tool for sustainable growth. In addition, it captures the transition of the city into an international city. Moreover, the social injustice that has resulted from the city rapid economic development is discussed at the end of the paper. Literature review According to Cressey, (2005) the urbanizations on China have been considered as unprecedented. Approximately 44% of Chinese live in the urban cities; the number is expected to reach 70% by the year 2035. The following fact about China imposes challenges to landscape urban planning and call for smart planning. First the China’s population is spatially unbalanced- Approximately 94% of its population will occupy 46% of the land in 2035. Secondly, the scarcity of resources in the country, China population is approximately 21% of the world population, but only has 7% of the world fresh water. Thirdly, China’s landscape is rich in heritage. According to Abbas, (2010) above fact impose two challenges in landscape urban planning that is sustainability and cultural and spiritual integrity. Sustainability: a broader population of China is exposed to disastrous natural forces as indicated by frequent flooding and drought in the country. About five billion ton of soil is eroded into the ocean and sea. Furthermore, desertification is on the rise. Other statics show that for the past fifty years China has lost about 50% of its wetland and 40% of the remaining wetland has been polluted (Cumings, 2007). Aside from the social and political reason, physical planning approach in the urban development planning is responsible for ecological and environmental degradation (Cumings, 2007). The Chinese system of planning was inherited from the Soviet Union. The single most important planning in the urban area is the population projection. All the urban land use plan, resources allocation, functional zoning, and infrastructure depend on the expected population. In most case, the long-term population projection is wrong which may call for change in urban planning. This urban development model influenced traditional landscape system and ecological destabilization of the landscape. It resulted to extensive soil erosion, forest destruction and extensive water, soil and air pollution. With the conventional approach, any environmental conservation planning and historical heritage planning was subordinate to comprehensive master planning. According to Gregory, & Ley (2009), the shortcoming of the conventional approach has been widely noticed, but changes occur slowly. In this regard, the Chinese urban planners are facing huge challenge. Thus, they are required to modify urban planning system from centrally planned to transitional economy reform. The evolutional change in planning approach was called in the past decade (Gregory, D. & Ley, 2009). Transition urbanism The assessment of China urban landscape depend on bringing the literature to the new cultural geography in the interpretation of the urbanism to conceptualize how contemporary landscape of urban development demonstrate an array of articulation with transitional sphere of economic and cultural form. Adams, Hoelscher, and Till, (2010) state that, transitional urbanism is viewed as a series of processes ideological, and material that underpins the production of the new built environment. Ecological infrastructure Ecological infrastructure is a biological preservation framework. It is composed of critical landscape structure that are strategically identified and planned for to preserve natural, biological, and cultural and recreation process. According to Adams, Hoelscher, and Till, (2010) ecological infrastructure preserve ecosystem services that are essential for sustaining human life. The Shenzhen growth pattern: identification and planning for ecological infrastructure Geographically the city of Shenzhen is very beautiful; it is surrounded by mountain and face the open sea on the south. However, rapid urbanization has drastically changed the city landscape. Through deforestation and reclamation, the once mountainous to sea pattern of the city no longer exist. The once highly agricultural landscape is replaced by flat cityscape in downtown areas. It is only in Lianhua hill, Bujia Mountain, and Wountong Mountain that still have fluctuant landforms. At the same time, the rural areas have also undergone massive urbanization. Only southeast coastline areas are on its primitive stage. Here there unexplored mountain vegetation, rivers, and other green infrastructures. Most of the villagers among this mountainous cost line retain their original lifestyle. However, there are some parts where seaside resort has been developed. Shenzhen is still crisscrossed by river. However, the current river system in the city has now a rare mainstream, but a large quantity of a small river widely distributed in the city. The Shenzhen experience a monsoon-influenced subtropical maritime climate. During the summer, the city experiences very hot humid weather. The vegetation is, therefore, important as it provide shade. Shenzhen is reach in vegetation. However, due to the rapid urbanization there has been rapid degradation of the vegetation cover. The leaders of the city have responded to this by focusing on strengthening the protection and restoration of the remnant forest and consolidating the green belts construction inside the built up areas. In fact, the Shenzhen city has the largest number of parks in China. Again to counter the environmental degradation, in year 2010, the Guangdong provincial government started the project ‘pearl river delta greenway network’. The greenway network under the Shenzhen city jurisdiction included inner green spaces that connected main urban parks nature reserve in mountainous areas west to the east corridor and some residential area for pedestrian and cyclist. The purpose of such greenways project was to protect the natural environment and provide recreational site for the residents. Due to The introduction of western planning concept in the city, the practice of planning moved from alienation to integration (Harvey, 2007)). Nowadays the planned open spaces, which were rare, are widely used. The urban open spaces in the city are made of urban parks based on remnant mountain landscape of big mountain, and Lianhua hill. The parks incorporated both local and international ideal to develop abundant entertainment. These theme parks provided the inexperienced people of the last century with an opportunity to view the world. The suburban open space consists of forest parks in west phones maintain and yang tai mountain beside the beach resort in the south east coastline such as xiaomeisha beach resort. Shenzhen towards the new ‘word city’ The city short history as unprecedented city of migrants and economic fortune belies its plan to become the among world cities. The city has grown from its manufacturing zone function to the world city of business service, high technology industries which are distinguished by its international standards architecture and urban culture amenities. What has taken hundreds of years in other societies, Shenzhen intend to achieve in a few decades. The plan of transforming the city into the urban environment of international significance has meant close adherence to plans for developing an excellent city infrastructure. Such infrastructure includes cultural centers such as libraries, high-rise office building, and efficient transport system. The centerpiece of the transformation of the Shenzhen into the world city is a city center project in Futian district. The planned city center project is located west of the original central business district of Shenzhen. When finished, it will become a concentration of service industries and the government city center. The larger district is designated for high technology development in an attempt to strengthen Shenzhen economic position in the larger Pearl River delta. The Futia planning is a reflection of an ambitious rationale of the city as not only as center of rapid economic growth but as a new city whose superior infrastructure quality and environmental will continue to attract international investment and continue to propel rapid modernization. The planned construction of the modern urban environment in the city has become a larger project to build a new world city from the ground upward in three to four decades. The city municipal authority is increasingly portraying image of Shenzhen in the symbolic language of transitional into an international city, a global city, and ecological city. To reiterate this presentation, the city planners regularly sought consultation from international architecture and planning firms. The idea of ecological city is also in line with the spirit of transitional and globalization. It has been populated in the international planning circles as eco media city. This is a more highly developed version of eco-city. The design has proposed an eco media city park in the form of scripture garden to symbolize the idea of environmental sustainability associated with visionary globally. The ecological city in Shenzhen involves greening the city by establishing the parks and maintaining high-quality appearance of landscaping along the major roads. Shenzhen new city center has no integral connection to the landscape of the imperial era; its planners have constructed the symbolic space of historical leadership at the center of once chaotic industrial zones. It can be seen that, The Shenzhen city planners are designing a new world city, like the regional economy with Chinese characteristic. Social injustice The social class of immigrant is polarized into two social extremes. One, the migrant workers with low level of education; secondly, the intellectual class with a high level of education. With very wide incomes, the social segregation between those two groups is very wide. The intellectual class lives in well-planned residential areas. They enjoy life conveniences such as open space and diverse public service. The migrant workers are poorly integrated into in the urban life. They live in low standards neighborhood that lay be hide in high-speed city urbanization. This neighborhood is overcrowded and lacks social facilities. Intensive work and continued lifestyle of hometown confines their social life and leisure activities with the surrounding of the narrow living space. Conclusion The landscape transition urbanism in the city simultaneously reflect it local and regional goal. The Futian city center project demonstrates transition urbanism to construct both historical and global significance structure. The numerous transitions in the city landscape signify the realization of the challenge physical planning approach and appreciation of landscape urbanism. References Abbas, A. (2010) Cosmopolitan descriptions: Shanghai and Hong Kong, Public Culture,12(3), pp. 769–786. Adams, P. C., Hoelscher, S. D. &Till, K. E.(2010) Textures of Place: Exploring Humanist Geographies. Minneapolis, MN: University ofMinnesota Press. Anderson, K & Gale, F. (2012) Inventing Places: Studies in Cultural Geography. Melbourne: Longman Cheshire. Appadurai, A. (2010). Disjuncture and difference in the global cultural economy, Public Culture, 2(2), pp. 1–23. Cressey, G. B. (2005) Land of the 500 Million A Geography of China. New York: McGraw-Hill. Cumings, B. (2007). Boundary displacement: area studies and international studies during and after the Cold War, Bulletin of ConcernedAsia Scholars, 29(1), pp. 6– 26. Gregory, D. & Ley, D. (2009) Culture’s geographies, Environment and Planning D, 6(2), pp. 115–127. Harvey, D. (2007). The Condition of Postmodernity. Oxford: Blackwell. Read More