Proceedings of the ICE, Urban Design and Planning

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Posted on: 7 October 2014
By: mackene
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The latest issue of the ICE Proceedings on Urban Design and Planning, Vol.167 Issue 5, 2014 contains the following articles on China:

Changing spatial planning in China’s five-year planning system

The five-year planning (FYP) system is very important in regulating economic and spatial development in China. By analysing the texts of five-year plans and corresponding spatial policies, as well as the primary governance issues since the foundation of the People’s Republic of China, this paper argues that market-oriented reform and decentralised economic administration have changed China’s political economy and necessitated transformation of the FYP mechanism. However, the emerging spatial governance mechanism is encountering many challenges and may not operate smoothly in the near future.

China’s urban planning and administrative urbanisation: case of Ordos

China’s urbanisation is characterised by strong state intervention, which includes various forms of urban planning made by local governments. Not much academic attention has been paid, however, to the relations between urban planning and urbanisation. This paper tries to narrow this gap by developing a theoretical framework based on the concept of ‘administrative urbanisation’ developed by Liu and co-workers. It is argued that urban planning in China not only provides the local states with a number of tools to manipulate various resources to shape their urban spatial structure and accelerate the pace of urban sprawl, but also legitimates the irrational decisions made by local government. The rationales and strategies facilitated by urban planning in the process of defining goals for the city, struggling for enough land conversion quota and attracting capitals and population to the planned areas, reflect the fundamental characteristics of ‘administrative urbanisation’. Ordos, a city newly formed over the last 15 years, is examined as a case under this framework. The importance of relations between urban planning and administrative urbanisation is also discussed.

A review of large-scale urban design in China

Since the 1980s, China has accumulated nearly 30 years of experience in modern urban design, during which time, large-scale urban design (LSUD), triggered by government-led rapid urbanisation in the late 1990s, arose as a main mission of physical planning. To analyse and interpret this special planning phenomenon in China, the paper traces the evolution of Chinese LSUD and examines it under specific phases of China’s socio-economic development, so as to first reveal the driving forces, various types, design methods and implementation approaches of China’s LSUD projects. By contextualising urban design within China’s unique statutory urban planning and design system, the paper then summarises the main gains and losses of physical planning development in China and puts forward some suggestions for transforming China’s physical planning and design in the future.

China’s urban planning in transition

Significant political and economic shifts since 1949 have affected urban planning practice in China. This paper examines the transition of urban planning systems in China, using Beijing as a case study. China’s master planning practice is divided into four stages – socialist master planning and anti-planning (1949–1978), reforming master planning (1979–late 1980s), urban development planning (early 1990s–2000) and comprehensive planning (2001–present). China’s urban planning is closely related to its political, economic and social development. Plan making, implementation and the construction of large infrastructure and public facilities have played significant roles in China’s rapid economic development. However, planning has also caused problems such as social injustice, environmental pollution and the uncoordinated development of municipal infrastructure, open spaces and human settlements.

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