The growing automobile culture

[bhchao]

have you noticed the urban environment in Chicago? There are a lot of high-density residential high-rises squeezed next to each other on North Michigan Ave right by the lake, with a close proximity to mass transit and retail stores. I think this could be one of several good models for Beijing.

The problem with high-density high-rises is that as you build new taller residential units packed next to each other, existing high-rise condo owners complain about the loss of view from their own buildings.

Usually the residential buildings with the highest property values are the ones with the best view. When that view is obstructed by a taller, newly constructed building, demand for the building with the obstructed view goes down, and that will eventually decrease its property value.

New York is a good example of this. The residential high-rise apartment buildings on Central Park West and Fifth Avenue overlooking Central Park have the highest real estate prices in the city, while residential high-rises whose views are blocked by a taller building have a much lower value.

I guess it's either sacrifice the property owners' concerns for the sake of preventing sprawl, or build low-density residential high-rises and encourage reckless horizontal growth.

[gato]

The loss of a view is not of much a problem in Beijing because there's not much a view to speak of, especially with the heavy gray smog that starts appearing at 7am everyday. It could be like New York, where the view is your neighbors across the street.

One phenomenon with residential development in Beijing is the building of quasi-gated communities with their own parks, shops, and so forth. It seems a way for wealthy condo dwellers to keep the outside at bay. This had led to very large-block developments. Such long blocks make walking tiring and less appealing. One article I read said that in Shanghai the average length of street block is about 100 meters, whereas in Beijing it's on the order of 400.

[Outofin]

I suspect one reason what I see in Haidian is that a high percentage of the land is owned by the government, such as housing area for state-owned enterprises or schools.

That is very insightful observation. I lived in that area for 20 years, so I was totally used to it and didn't think this way. You're right. Too many universities, research institutes, schools. There is no many places for estate developers. 中科院 takes too many lands in Zhongguancun and they like living in 6 floors building. In 2000, they erased a huge area and did some re-construction but still replaced with low height buildings.

One phenomenon with residential development in Beijing is the building of quasi-gated communities with their own parks, shops, and so forth.

So-called 大院文化. Think the unversities build up walls all surrouding their properties.

[bhchao]

One phenomenon with residential development in Beijing is the building of quasi-gated communities with their own parks, shops, and so forth. It seems a way for wealthy condo dwellers to keep the outside at bay. This had led to very large-block developments.

That's unfortunate. That is like a 'city within a city', and cuts off those residents from the urban fabric. How far are those gated communities from the urban center? I assume there would be some driving to and from those communities.

[gato]

These semi-gated communities exist both in the city center and the surburbs. At least that's true for Beijing where these cities-within-a-city have been quite popular. I'm not sure about other cities in China. Old Shanghai's lot sizes tend to smaller, so it may be only widespread in the newer areas like Pudong.

I think a consideration for the developers is that infrastructure around the areas developed might be much poorer than standards of the project. Therefore they feel the need to develop certain private infrastructures, like parks and shops, within an enclosed area both for the practical needs of their buyers and as a way to distingush themselves from the older, poorer, and usually dirtier environment outside.

As for Beijing, it'll be interesting to see what they do with the hutongs they're in the process of tearing down and replacing. I heard that there's a height restriction of five, six stories for new buildings with the Second Ring. Without such restrictions, you'd undoubtedly see only highrises for such prime real estate. The restrictions are supposed enacted to protect the historical character of Beijing. I think they probably cover too wide an area. The area within the Second Ring is about 3 miles by 5 miles. That's about the size of Manhattan south of Central Park. But maybe it's not too bad. Greenwich Village in NYC has mostly five, six-story building, too.

The area within Beijing's Third Ring, by the way, is already more than twice the size of Manhattan, being a roughly 8 miles by 8 miles square, compared to the roughly 3 miles by 9 miles rectangle of Manhattan. The Fourth Ring is about 10 miles and 10 miles, and the Fifth 16 by 16. It seems that most new residential developments are being built between the 4th and 5th Ring. I would definitely consider that to be the suburb. It usually takes at least an hour to commute by bus from there to the city center during non-rush hour.

[Outofin]

Offer you guys some first hand info from an ex-naive resident.

I lived in such a community, an university. Basically I could live without leaving. It has stores, food market, public bath house, kingdergarden, school, banks, post office... everything you can think of. But of course I would go out if I wanted to have better quality of services and products. I think it's okay to make it like this, because it's indeed convenient. But from the perspective of city plan, the problem is wall. All the utilities are not open to public, because the univ funded them and they're meant to serve the staff only. Walls are built because many strangers would wander into it if without the walls, and the residents inside would start to loss thier belongings. So the structure looks ugly and has its reasons.

The old Beijing is mainly hutongs. When gov't started to build all these gov't departments, universities, factories, or in Chinese, 单位, everything, they found it easy to do it in outside the old city. They had plenty of unused lands. They made a 大院 here, a 大院 there. That's all we got today. That's a totally different story from cities like Shanghai.

[gato]

Any idea on what the population size of Beijing was during the Qing dynasty? How did it compare with other Chinese cities? Was there any restriction on immigration into Beijing because it was the imperial capitol?

[Outofin]

It's a little off the topic of automobile, isn't it? gato, maybe you can start a new thread on city planning or Beijing history, which seems to have caught your interests. Beijing is the most struggling city in the world, because it's one of the oldest cities, and it's one of fastest developing cities at the same time. Beijing has made many mistakes. People today are still moaning about the loss of old city wall, which was replaced by the present 2nd Ring Road. I don't know how many tourists arriving Beijing would ask, "Where is the city wall? You should have some." Fortunately, the city of Xi'an still preseves their ancient city wall. The good thing is that officials are more and more open to public opinions. Some small changes from famous historical sites could easily hit local or national headlines. Like the ticket price change of Forbidden City, water system of Yuanming Yuan. Several years ago, the construction of Ping An Street also raised hot debates.

[gato]

Just a litte, Outofin, but I think the shape of a city is related to the development of an automobile culture. Beijing doesn't have the largest population in China, yet it has the largest number of private automobiles in China. That's probably somewhat related to the layout of the city. Even Manhattan is one of the wealthiest place on earth, there is no automobile culture there. Most Manhattanites think cars are for those who are unfortunate enough to live in suburbs. Los Angeles is where the automobile culture thrives in the U.S., mostly because it's a city designed for cars, I think.

[Outofin]

Yes, people love driving here. And the width of Beijing's roads give people a ILLUSION that it has a good road system that could support a good amount of cars, which proved wrong.

[bhchao]

Most Manhattanites think cars are for those who are unfortunate enough to live in suburbs. Los Angeles is where the automobile culture thrives in the U.S., mostly because it's a city designed for cars, I think.

What is unique about Manhattan is its geography. NY is a city of islands (except for the Bronx) whose physical boundaries are fixed. So there's no way to expand beyond the island of Manhattan. Therefore there is no chance of creating sprawl.

Los Angeles does not have a set boundary (it's a collection of suburbs without any character), and doesn't even have an urban center. There is a freeway cutting right through the heart of Downtown, isolating ethnic neighborhoods. Neighborhoods are defined by where they are positioned in relation to the freeway.

Houston is also a city that is car-oriented, full of sprawl, and downright ugly.

Check out what New Yorkers wrote in this thread: http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?t=7122&page=2&pp=15

Many of them look down on cities that are car oriented, such as LA and Houston. I selected LA in that poll.

The good thing is that officials are more and more open to public opinions.

In New York there is an acronym called NIMBY (Not In My Backyard), referring to the sentiments of NYC community activists who oppose developments that might damage a neighborhood's character.

A good example of NIMBYs in action is their opposition to Walmarts in NYC. Walmart is a perfect example of a suburban establishment that caters to a car-oriented consumer base. The retail chain has stores in every major US city except NYC. It has tried repeatedly to open a first store there, but failed because New Yorkers fiercely oppose any Walmarts in the city.

[bhchao]

How severe are the driving habits of Beijing residents, and what are the fatality rates? I heard some people there even drive on the sidewalks (no offense ). In the US, driving norms and regulations have been set in place for decades, while China is currently in the process of developing driving regulations.

If Beijing sprawls outward as a result of accomodating the automobile, more rural land will be cleared to make way for concrete to build highways. This will make Beijing even hotter since vegetation helps cool the surrounding area. Beijing is already hot as it is, with its constant dust storms. The lack of vegetation would make the smog condition even worse.

LA is very hot due to the lack of vegetation. If you ever are in an airplane over LA, down below is a network of highways and a wide swath of concrete.

[Green Pea]

Yes, they drive on sidewalks and then blast the horn expecting you to get out of their way. Idiots.

[Outofin]

How severe are the driving habits of Beijing residents, and what are the fatality rates? I heard some people there even drive on the sidewalks (no offense ).

China's fatality rate is the highest in the world. In 2004, 99217 died due to accidents. I wouldn't be too surprised if in some small towns, new drivers drive on the sidewalks. Though I don't think drivers in major cities can be so mad.

My friends told me, even though I drive here everyday, don't ever try to drive in Beijing. My father was once caught by a traffic camera for not stopping at red light. He was fined. I was angry about him for not being careful and not behaving in his age. (But I couldn't advise him too much because he's my father.) He said he thought no one would know because that was night and no one was nearby.

A picture taken in China I saw the other day on web. At an intersection, the signs say you can't turn left, can't turn right either and you're not allowed go straight. Cars are lining up there, confused.

[bhchao]

This article from Metropolis Magazine talks about urban planning in Beijing revolving around the hutongs, and the issue of historic preservation. Here are some segments of the article. Any thoughts?

http://www.metropolismag.com/cda/story.php?artid=1117

"On a forlorn spit of earth overlooking a vast construction pit a few miles west of Beijing’s Forbidden City, a single hutong—a cluster of traditional one-story houses surrounding a courtyard—is all that remains of what was once a neighborhood. The red paint on the doors is flaking, but the sloping tile roofs are still perfect. In every direction the steel-and-glass frames of new high-rises rear out of the mud, attended by flocks of yellow cranes. An entire quadrant of hutongs, half a mile on a side, has been flattened to make way for Beijing Finance Street, the centerpiece of the capital’s new financial district....

Then again, maybe it won’t. Beijing Finance Street is “a disastrous development,” says Liang Wei, deputy director of Beijing Tsinghua Urban Planning & Design Institute. “It’s on the wrong site. If it was just empty land, like in Nevada or somewhere, that’d be okay.” But the hutong neighborhoods, with their lazy tree-lined alleyways and tiny storefronts, are the heart of Beijing’s traditional residential culture. And the city is already losing them at a frenzied pace. With the value of real estate skyrocketing to $70 a square foot, the pressure to put up commercial high-rises is overwhelming. In 2003 Beijing built around 225 million square feet of new housing, roughly as much as that in all of Florida. Indeed much of Beijing has come to resemble urban Florida: garish high-rise condos between grids of six-lane boulevards...

“The demolition has accelerated with the Olympics in sight,” says Beijing-based architect Yung Ho Chang. The city planning commission has protected 42 historic areas around the Forbidden City. But some sources estimate that by 2008, ninety percent of the city’s original 6,000 hutongs will have been razed.

It sounds like a classic Jane Jacobs script: prestige-driven government/business megaprojects destroying organic mixed-use neighborhoods and annihilating historical traces and local character. But that would be an outsider’s perspective. Many Chinese are glad to sacrifice the hutongs for modern high-rise apartments. Hutongs lack indoor plumbing and insulation, and most are wildly overcrowded. “These areas are in very bad condition,” says Yan Huang, deputy director of Beijing’s Municipal Planning Commission. Chen Dan, a 23-year-old student I met outside a soon-to-be-demolished hutong, voiced a typical view: “These buildings are old and small, and China has too many people.”

The lack of interest in hutongs isn’t just practical—it reflects a cultural aesthetic difference. “People here don’t understand the notion of preservation as Europeans do,” Chang says. Where the Chinese do preserve landmarks, they tend to Disney-ify them, sprucing up exteriors with colorful imitation materials. Chang thinks it has to do with the continuity of Chinese cultural history. In Europe, the rise and fall of successive civilizations led to clear distinctions between building styles and specific historical eras. In China, whose civilization has been fairly continuous for more than 2,000 years, Chang says, “People don’t differentiate between the old and the new.”....

So if most Chinese don’t care that the hutongs are disappearing, why should we? Should SOM be lambasted for participating in Beijing’s destruction of its own heritage or lauded for at least doing so in a well-planned, pedestrian-friendly way? It’s hard not to feel that 20 years from now millions of Beijingers will look back in anger at some of the decisions made during the city’s frantic modernization, much as today’s New Yorkers mourn the loss of Penn Station. But what if they don’t? Do foreigners really have any business venturing an opinion on how China should modernize its urban landscape?

Not that this discussion is an easy one, as can attest Steven Townsend, former head of SOM’s Hong Kong office. In one meeting with Chinese officials and urban planners to review a new suburban development, Townsend asked why they were privileging private cars over public transit. “I said, ‘You don’t have to make all the mistakes we Americans made,’” he recalls. “And they were offended. Their response was, ‘We have every right to make all of the mistakes you made.’”

This kind of urban planning, in which space is analogous to cosmology and political power, is not easy to harmonize with more modern understandings of how cities thrive. For example, Beijing’s mighty perpendicular avenues are starting to gridlock as the number of private cars explodes. “The avenues are wide enough, but there aren’t enough smaller streets for people to take detours,” Chang explains.

Of course, any traffic system would buckle under Chinese-style growth. More than 1,000 new cars hit the streets of Beijing every day—140,000 in the first four months of this year. Even the taxi drivers seem baffled; their shortcuts turn into bottlenecks from one day to the next. “I remember watching them build the second ring road, in 1980 or so, and thinking, ‘They’re crazy,’” recalls Eva Sternfeld, a geographer who first came to Beijing in the late 1970s. “They had no cars—there were donkey carts on the elevated freeway.” Today the city’s five ring roads are packed with cars, and they’re building a sixth....

The issue of historic preservation is only one of a legion of problems raised by China’s breakneck urban development. The Loeb Fellows whom Wood was showing around had just finished a two-week tour of China, and much of what they saw had horrified them: repetitive, aesthetically numbing megadevelopments; an utter lack of attention to the relation between structures or to integrating residential with industrial, service, or other functions; madly wasteful energy use; runaway growth of private cars and failing public transport; and development proceeding faster than governments could plan for it. “What upsets me,” one of the fellows said, “is that they took all of these things that by the late eighties everyone in the world knew just absolutely do not work, and they went right ahead and did them.”

But the fellows were also impressed by the sophistication and sincerity of the younger generation of Chinese architects and urban planners they’d met. Westerners working in China agree. “There’s a great will to do sustainable development, to improve urban conditions, to reduce pollution,” says Vera Deus of Albert Speer & Partner, authors of a new master plan for Beijing and designers of Anting, a new satellite town in Shanghai. “But if a big developer comes in with a project that’s counter to the planners’ strategy, then usually the money wins.” The question is whether the increasingly sophisticated designers and planners will be able to take control of China’s urban growth before it’s too late...

[Outofin]

I’m a preservationist. I wrote the short story Beijing Tonight, in which I portrait Beijing as a city struggling between the past and the future. This is a very important topic and it’s the main concern of Beijing’s residents and many historians. It deserves attentions of all who care about Chinese architecture and history. What if a person steals a brick from the Great Wall? That’s a crime, isn’t it? Hutongs are not like the Great Wall, but the large scale of demolishment of hutongs is a huge loss to us people and our culture. And the situation is worse because it’s all under the government’s plan.

A whole city of old Beijing is actually a master piece and a gift that our ancestor left for us. But it’s practically impossible and it’s unfair to restrain such a city and its residents’ ambitions to improve their lives. The city of Ping Yao is preserved as a whole city and the lives there are nothing more than stale and even worth sympathy. But for cities like Beijing we could and must do our best efforts to find a balanced point between history and modernization.

Like I mentioned in an early post, the construction of Ping An street raised hot debates. The people against it were mainly concerned in

1. It will ruin Beijing’s layout, because the city’s layout presents a whole idea and philosophy and ancestors.

2. It will remove many Hutong communities. Furthermore, it removes authentic Hutongs and replaces with bogus traditional buildings along the street. It’s so ironic.

The other side’s point is that, although the preservationists admire the communities so much, the houses have already been damaged too much and almost unlivable due to overpopulation. And most residents there are looking forward to move into apartments in high-rise. To me, this is not a very good point, because re-furbishing the houses and reducing the population is no difficult if we have a good plan. The only thing we can do is to erase them all? No, it’s all estate developers’ propaganda. What a new building would worth? A million, ten millions? Couldn’t you build it elsewhere? What does a building with 200 years history worth? Priceless, because you can not build history!

I haven’t read the article yet because it’s quite long. I’ve seen in the beginnings it talks about the Beijing Financial Street. I’ll read it. It’s important. It’s a nightmare seeing all old buildings are stamped by a big red 拆.

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I've finished the article. Thank you. It's a well-written and informative report which fairly presents different views from different people and gives readers a good sense of what's happening. But a little cold if I may say.

[gato]

The preservation of the hutongs would be more feasible economically and from a traffic perspective if the city made a more coordinated to move the commercial centers of the city away from Xidan and Wangfujing. For example, make the CBD (Central Business District) in the southeast and Haidian/Zhongguancun in the northwest into two primary job centers with high-density residential housing nearby. People can then live near where they work and not need to go through the old center of Beijing, which can then be reserved for government offices and tourists. The hutongs can be renovated and probably will be converted into luxury homes in any case since the land there is so valueable and centrally located.

Preserving single-story housing like the hutongs in the center of Beijing without moving the commercial center away seems like a non-starter to me.

[Outofin]

I can’t agree more with you on that hutongs should be upgraded to luxury homes, because the force of market economy is irresistible. If you look at some home improvement magazines, you’d notice that some rich people decorate their homes with a quite traditional sense. They will be potential buyers. To me, it’s just cool and stylish to have a Si He Yuan (四合院) in the inner city.

Actually even if they take out hutongs and put on new projects, high-rise is never an option. It’s illegal. The city has height regulation within the 3rd ring road, because people don’t want modern buildings dwarf historic buildings. Even though I don’t know the exact height limits for different areas, the rule is actually very simple, which is, when you stand on the Square, you would be awed by the grandness of the Gate of Heavenly Peace, with no cheap skyscrapers coming into sight.

Consider this, CBD is on the 3rd ring road, and Zhongguancun is already on the 4th ring road. They help the city developing outward. But suggesting moving commercial centers like Xidan and Wangfujing doesn’t seem like a good idea. The city itself evolves in this way. It just happened this way. Wangfujing has long enjoyed domestic reputation, just like Nanjing road in Shanghai. It’s hard and unwise to downgrade its role. CBD is at its current location is because all embassies are in that area and in the very beginning, Guomao was built there, which attracted global companies. Zhongguancun developed because the abundant research resources in that area. City planning is really more like Wei Qi (围棋) than chess. Once you put a piece on the board, you can't move it later on.

[bhchao]

Earlier this year Seoul sent a team of transportation experts to Taipei to study why Seoul's subway system has a deficit, while Taipei's MRT operated at a profit after just 3 years in operation.

The shopping districts in Taipei, 信義, 西門町, and 士林 are easily accessible by the MRT. The close proximity of these districts with subway stations mean that shoppers who had to previously sit through traffic to travel from one district to the next, could hop on the MRT and easily get from point A to point B in a short timeframe.

Also the MRT announcement system is broadcast in three dialects and one foreign language: Mandarin, Minnan-hua, Hakka, and English. So residents and foreigners in Taipei find the MRT a blessing for the city.

Compare this to NYC subways, where announcements are made in English only despite the city's cultural diversity.

Furthermore Taipei's MRT has the second fewest malfunctions in the world, making the system very convenient and user-friendly.

Just last month rider usage in the MRT reached 2 billion to date.

http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2005/08/14/2003267685

Here is a more objective look at how the MRT system reduced traffic congestion in Taipei. http://www.amcham.com.tw/publication_topics_view.php?volume=32&vol_num=9&topics_id=258 Do you see any similarities to the situation in Beijing?

[gato]

The most established part of the Beijing subway is the loop around the 2nd Ring Road. Since there're restriction on high-density residential development within the 2nd Ring and most people live outside the 3rd Ring, there's a drastic mismatch between where people live and where the subway goes.