Planning in Shanghai

Abstract

Shanghai’s urbanisation has been growing rapidly for 40 years, the urban land of the central city expanding quickly. Near-suburban industrial parks in the 1959 Plan have become parts of ‘the two wings’ in the 1984 Plan. Satellite towns Ming Hang, Wu .lin and Bao Shan, as well as rural towns neighbouring the central city, increasingly have become connected. More than 1000 high-rise flats appeared in the central city, of which 60% were in the old built-up area, forming new ultrahigh density developments. Stressing the development of the east side of Huang Pu River to decentralise the old city, Shanghai has tended to develop in a transriver way. The central city will turn into an agglomeration, a linear zone with the Huang Pu River as its basic axis. The limitation of the urban planning structure and population will be broken (Fig. 1). A series of problems concerning the coming century need to be answered. What will be the change in urban planning structure? How will the planning of urban function, road and traffic and infrastructure systems be adjusted? How can we control urban fringe and urban sprawl? How can we turn the Huang Pu River into an axis for urban living ? All these problems can serve as the background to this article.