Architecture and Design

TheCityFix.com: Is There a Future for Human-Scale Chinese Cities?

(Originally published on TheCityFix.com)

James Fallows of the Atlantic recently blogged about “today’s enormous, expanding Chinese cities,” comparing the more intimate architecture of Shanghai to the sprawling concrete slabs in Beijing.

“This is not a ‘which do you like better?’ discussion,” he emphasizes.

Rather the question is why the look and feel of Beijing seem so clearly to represent the direction Chinese cities are heading. To oversimplify what this means: although Shanghai probably contains more people than Beijing, it feels smaller. The roads are narrower, they’re more likely to bend or twist, the city unfolds on a smaller scale of neighborhoods and courtyards and little houses. Beijing is bigger and squarer and broader and more grandly imposing.

Fallows confesses that he prefers “the look and feel” of Shanghai and then goes on to ask himself why he feels that way:

“Do I like these small streets and human-scale settings in Shanghai because I am foreign?”

It’s an interesting question. Consider a Mercer Consulting study published in BusinessWeek about the “World’s Top 100 Most Livable Cities,” ranked by the “quality of life” they offer to expatriate executives and their families. Zurich, Geneva, Vancouver and Vienna top the list. Shanghai comes in at #100, flanked by Bratislava, Slovakia and Johor Baharu, Malaysia. Beijing comes even further down the list at #116. Other Chinese cities towards the bottom include Guangzhou, Nanjing, Shenyang and Jilin. Certainly, in this study, it appears expats prefer safe (i.e. Zurich), walkable (i.e. Vancouver) and clean (i.e. Vienna) places to live. But it’s hard to imagine why locals wouldn’t want the same thing.

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