DO GOOD URBAN PLANNING1
MAY 16, 1990
Why have I always wanted to come to the Academy of Urban Planning? Because planning is very important, and also because I hear some of you have different views. I’ve come today mainly to exchange thoughts, beginning with the importance of planning. The quality of a construction project should be good enough to last for a hundred years. Thus planning is major work that will affect generations to come—it can have an impact for a very long period.
Whether or not planning is done well will have a direct effect on economic and social benefits. At the time, because of [the desire to save] a few camphor trees, only two lanes of traffic were built on Hongqiao Road, and these became inadequate after little more than a year. Now that we’ve built four lanes, Chinese and foreigners alike are clapping for joy. If the planning then had insisted on facing the facts and insisted on four lanes, the benefits would have been great and we would have saved the state quite a lot of money.
But urban planning isn’t just a question of yielding economic benefits; it also touches on social and political issues. You at the academy should be aware of the importance of your responsibilities. Whether you are meticulous in your work and whether you are truly acting responsibly will all affect the future and the happiness of the people of Shanghai. I hope you’ll be aware of the importance and glorious nature of your responsibilities. Keep your minds on your work and do it with gusto. This is my first point.
My second point is that the planning team in Shanghai is to be commended—it is of fairly high caliber. You’ve done a great amount of work and made tremendous contributions. Your work has been hard and you’ve been very diligent—this basic fact should be recognized.
My third point is that planning in Shanghai faces difficulties but also favorable conditions. Having developed as a semi-colony, the city was laid out very poorly; the roads are haphazard, and various facilities are lacking. However, Shanghai has been a relatively open city so it has absorbed the best from urban developments in many countries. It can lay claim to being a world expo of architecture—with its great variety of buildings, it might be the only city of its sort in the entire country. This has become a treasure for the people, surrounding them with the architectural styles of many countries, and has kept the city from looking monotonous.
In our urban planning, we must retain the city’s unique features. Buildings with a long history should not be casually demolished—they should be restored. Henceforth one requirement for urban planning in Shanghai will be that the city’s own style should be maintained, but it should also develop in line with the trends of modern cities—equal attention must be paid to both these approaches. We have to keep in mind that its features should reflect a city that is open and cosmopolitan, and whose economy is primarily an externally oriented one. We must take the long-term view of the city and not set standards too low.
My fourth point is that we must think about issues that touch on the immediate interests of the people and that are in urgent need of attention. This is a very important part of urban planning. On the one hand, we have to set our sights farther—our long-term vision is to build a great cosmopolitan city. On the other hand, we must consider practical problems that the people urgently need to have solved. Communities should have schools, hospitals, kindergartens, day-care centers, parks, shopping, and entertainment—as one person has remarked, we should “build an area, manage that area, and beautify that area.” Land in Shanghai is very precious. We should establish a group to study high-rise residences and determine the most economical height for such residences in Shanghai. There must be gas connections: underground pipes should be added to plans, and we must insist on a construction sequence of first doing underground work, then above-ground work. Therefore planning should integrate the issues of a great cosmopolitan city with the issues that people urgently need solutions for.
My fifth point is that planning should incorporate three perspectives.
1. An overall perspective with comprehensive master planning. Plans should be made from a big-picture perspective and arrangements should be made under unified direction. The Municipal Planning Bureau and the Academy of Urban Planning, in particular, must have a strong overall perspective. Someone has said that we only have plans for roads at the moment, but none for traffic, and that we haven’t done a good job of studying the layout of traffic. We’ve now established an Institute of Comprehensive Urban Traffic Planning and a Pudong Development Planning and Design Institute precisely to strengthen our overall perspective and to reinforce master planning for all of Shanghai. The Academy of Urban Planning should strengthen its guidance for these two institutes.
Pudong was recently preparing to designate a plot of land for an investor from Taiwan, but quite a few factories had already been built on the land they were going to designate, so how could they follow through with this? Shanghai already has a master plan, but it’s still too general—there are no detailed plans, and district plans are also not very detailed. That’s why we are determined to strengthen our planning capacity. The Academy of Urban Planning has over 90 technical people among its front-line staff—that isn’t enough. Shall we make it around 150 or so? Also, we must emphasize strengthening the planning done by district governments, and must also increase staffing for this. We should strengthen them all, from the districts to the academy to the Bureau of Planning. Shanghai must strengthen planning; otherwise it will be at a disadvantage in the future.
Pudong is being developed to aid in the dispersal of Shanghai’s population. If people aren’t dispersed, we won’t be able to solve the traffic problems. From now on we’ll build housing of 5 million square meters floor space each year. This will provide housing for 100,000 households, or 300,000 people. That will be 3 million people in 10 years, and arrangements should be made for 2 million of them to move to Pudong. To develop Pudong, it will also be necessary to drum up interest in the area among all districts and counties, as well as other provinces and municipalities. I’m in favor of giving each district and county a piece of land in Pudong to call its own. This will require a preferential policy to induce them to build housing and move industries there. Then we’ll also set aside a few pieces of land for other provinces and municipalities. The development of Chongming is well worth studying. Shanghai’s best land is in Chongming and the climate there is good—planning agencies should hurry up and draw up plans for it. From now on, we must not casually issue any permits for the coastline—every inch of land there must be given careful consideration.
2. A farsighted view of development. Planning must think ahead of its time. When [Mayor] Li Ruihuan built three ring roads in Tianjin, with that one stroke he determined the layout of both the city and its traffic—that is thinking ahead of its time. A city cannot do without a high-speed ring road. In building Shanghai’s high-speed ring road we should draw on the experiences of other cities. The entire section in Puxi should be elevated and connected to the two major bridges; overpasses can be built in the Pudong section. As for how it should be built, we must quickly study that aspect of the project and come up with a plan. Time waits for no one, so we should act quickly. If we can’t do a good job of traffic within three years, “the development of Pudong” will be an empty phrase.
3. Integrating perspectives of all the people. In planning, you not only have to integrate the perspectives of people at levels both above and below you, you must also stir up the enthusiasm of all parties and listen to the views of all sides—you absolutely must not just sit in a room and plan. We should now be summing up experiences, rationalizing systems, and correcting things if we did not do them properly. We should first rely on the districts and counties, start strengthening our planning capacities from the grass roots up, and establish district and county planning agencies. The Municipal Planning Bureau should strengthen supervision and inspections and should manage strictly; it should offer training courses and organize district and county heads to hear about Shanghai’s plan and study the “Urban Planning Law.” You should tell them about Shanghai’s long-term development goals and about the principles of planning so that they have a command of some knowledge and don’t give orders blindly. Next, you should summarize the experiences and lessons of the past two years and quickly devise corresponding regulations and institutions, so that the city is governed by law.
Your work is ahead of the times. If it isn’t, all of Shanghai will fall behind. I hope you will energize yourselves a hundredfold and do further good planning in order to constantly adapt to the needs of Shanghai’s shift in strategic emphasis and its rapidly developing situation.
1. This is the main part of Zhu Rongji’s speech at a seminar attended by over 50 planning experts and managers at the Shanghai Academy of Urban Planning and Design.