HCMC: mirroring the city center, inversing contemporary logics

Abstract

Ho Chi Minh City (HCMC), the largest agglomeration in Vietnam, is a multitude of cities and where spatial development is inherently intertwined with a continuously transforming water structure. HCMC is a relatively young city—the foundational citadel dates from the end 18th century—that nevertheless was always complex. Its original dichotomic nature, with Chinese Chợ Lớn and Vietnamese Sài Gòn, forcefully colonized and domesticated a quagmire. It eventually became colonized itself by France (formalized by the Indochina federation 1887-1954). The agglomeration subsequently underwent strong growth and transformation during the American War (1955-75), to explode even more after the (re)opening up to the market in 1986 (Đổi Mới: the change to the new). Shock and wave development (and significant disruption), hand-in-hand with forceful public intervention and laissez-faire dynamics, led to odd bedfellows—a partially planned and spontaneous urban environment, iterating between conscious design decisions anchored on territorial characteristics (predominantly defined by water structures) and generic additions regardless of the terrain, between structuring and undirected fabrics. Amidst another wave of rampant growth and expansion, the city plans to double its center eastwards across the Sài Gòn River in the water-sick districts 2, 9 and Thu Duc. This offers the occasion to boldly rethink the formation of the contemporary tropical deltaic metropolis. The article will plead for an alternative for the future development of HCMC through the elaboration of a project for the twin center of Sài Gòn, foreseen in an interfluvial land that is systematically permeated by canals, river branches, ditches, etc. The plan recognizes that the water system defines the base spatial register of the territory and intelligently anchors urban development on this register.