A leader in fashion, business and commerce, as the city with the
densest population in the world's most populous country, Shanghai
also takes the lead in urban development.
With an overall population density of more than 2,800 people per
square kilometer, compared with 900 in Beijing and fewer than 400
in Chongqing, Shanghai's central Huangpu district has a whopping
126,500 people per square kilometer; giving each person less than 8
square meters.
So many people living in such a small space places enormous
pressures on basic amenities.
To alleviate this pressure and to prevent the problem spreading,
planning authorities have been following a strategy of
suburbanization moving people out of ageing low-rise buildings in
the city center to newly built suburbs farther out of town.
Early this year, as part of China's 11th Five-Year Plan
(2006-10), the Shanghai Urban Planning Bureau released a framework
"1966 plan" outlining their strategy for the development of the
Shanghai Municipality.
The plan defines the 600-square-kilometer area within Shanghai's
outer ring road as central Shanghai. Outside the ring road,
according to the plan, nine new towns with a combined population of
5.4 million and 60 new small towns with populations of around
50,000 each will be built.
As well as being populated by migrant workers who flock to the
municipality, drawn by its economic success, these towns will also
be home to Shanghainese displaced from the city center.
Expansion of the transport network including the metro, roads,
railways and maglev will allow people to live away from downtown
Shanghai but easily commute into the center for work.
But while the economic and strategic reasons for this exodus
make sense, and hundreds of thousands of families have benefited
from improved living conditions as a result of moving, the strategy
has not been without controversy.
As historic residential areas of the city have made way for
commercial high-rises, whole communities have been displaced, and,
some argue, valuable heritage has been lost.
In a crumbling colonial terrace block no more than 100 meters
from Shanghai's centerpiece Xintiandi shopping street, Cai Li, her
husband and two children share a single room.
Their home resembles a train compartment: A bed folds down from
the wall when Cai's son and daughter, both at secondary school,
come home for the weekend. The bathroom and kitchen are communal,
shared with neighbors who live similarly cramped lives.
It has long been known that the area is slated for demolition,
but the family refuses to leave.
"If the demolition goes ahead, we will have to move to suburbs
an hour and a half from downtown Shanghai," said Cai, whose job as
a house-cleaner relies on her living close to the affluent families
who employ her.
"Our new home would be bigger, but if we move, I don't know if I
will be able to find work."
Weighing the known benefits of a move to the suburbs against the
potential pitfalls of such a change is a problem faced by
millions.
Zhu Minyu, a 50-year-old Shanghai native, used to live in the
center of downtown Shanghai in Huaihai Middle Road.
She, her husband and their son shared a 20-square-meter room,
communal toilet and kitchen.
In 2004, fed up with the lack of space, they sold it and used
the money to cover the down payment on a new 800,000 yuan
(US$100,000), five-room, 200-square-meter flat in Pudong's Sanlin
District.
"We have a big balcony, and all the rooms are bright and catch
the sun," Zhu said. "It's so much better than the old place, but I
still miss living in the middle of the city.
"At first I found living here really inconvenient, boring and
lonely. It has taken me quite a while to adjust. I used to bump
into people I knew all the time on Huaihai Road, but here in
Sanlin, the streets are mostly empty.
"If I do go downtown, I can't stay after the buses stop at 10 pm
because catching a taxi home is too expensive."
But things are improving as the suburbs develop, more amenities
move in. A new shopping mall near Zhu's home opened in May, and by
2009 Sanlin will be just a 15-minute subway ride from downtown.
As for the administration of the strategy, residents who are
relocated to make way for private developers are usually provided
with replacement homes by the company responsible for the project,
and for government projects, such as expansion of the metro, a
complex formula is used to calculate lump-sum compensation.
Based on the size of the home a family leaves, payments usually
equate to 4,000-8,000 yuan (US$500-1,000) per square meter but can
vary widely depending on the location and condition of the property
and the negotiating skills of the homeowners.
The government is also responsible for providing a sufficient
supply of cheap housing for displaced families to move into.
In suburbs such as Pudong, government-built flats cost
4,500-5,500 yuan (US$563-688) per square meter, which figures out
to about 350,000 yuan (US$43,750) for a 70-square-meter,
two-bedroom unit.
The system has not been without its problems, however. Some
families have had to be forcibly evicted, and in January 2005 an
elderly couple were killed by a fire deliberately set to intimidate
them into moving.
A deputy general manager and two workers from the Shanghai Urban
Development Housing Relocation Co Ltd were found guilty of starting
the blaze. The manager and one of the workers received death
sentences suspended for two years, and the third man was given a
life sentence.
Attempts to interview relevant Shanghai government officials
regarding relocation issues were unsuccessful, but it's clear that
increasingly residents in the city center are opting to move to the
suburbs as a lifestyle decision.
Information technology consultant Xiang Yu, 35, and his wife
struck out for the suburbs two years ago, moving out of the flat
they rented in downtown Shanghai.
"I was sick of the crowded streets, tall buildings and high
prices downtown," Xiang said. "Out here we have more parks, more
plants, more space, better air quality and less noise. I have no
complaints at all about suburban life."
A short walk from the terminal stop of Metro Line 1, the
Xinzhuang residential area that the couple now call home has
developed into a mature community over the past 10 years, replete
with shopping centers, post offices, schools and hospitals.
It's a model for what the currently remote suburbs beyond the
outer ring road will soon become as the density is reduced,
replaced by a type of suburban sprawl.
(China Daily July 3, 2006)