RPT-MIT architect says China cities hard to live in
01 Dec 2006 08:36:38 GMT Source: Reuters
(Repeats to fix typo in headline) By John Ruwitch HONG KONG, Dec 1 (Reuters) - China's soaring economy has spawned an urban construction boom that is giving architects unprecedented opportunities, but its cities ironically are becoming less liveable, a top Chinese architect said on Friday. A forest of skyscrapers, stadiums and gaudy city halls have sprouted in cities across China -- a product of strong economic growth since the 1990s, burgeoning wealth and government encouraged migration from rural to urban areas. "We are maybe making some pretty interesting, good buildings, but our cities, in general, I don't think they're getting better at all," said Yung Ho Chang, the Chinese-born head of the architecture department at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). "I really see kind of a new Chinese city being built which is really only for the purpose of economic development," Chang, 50, told reporters on the sidelines of a Hong Kong Design Centre conference. In many places, including Beijing, old neighbourhoods are being razed at breakneck speed to make way for eye-catching apartment blocks and wide boulevards."How people may live in the city, how people may enjoy the city, I don't think was really a major priority ... I don't think they are particularly convenient or comfortable compared with older cities in China, the traditional cities." Some places are starting to consider how to make cities more liveable, and Chang raised the example of Shenzhen -- a sprawling metropolis across the border from Hong Kong that was a tiny fishing village when economic reforms began 27 years ago. But he said the challenges are formidable. "In my view, it is a bit too late already because a lot of mistakes made in the past, in the first urbanisation, aren't that easy -- are probably quite impossible even -- to correct." As far as architecture is concerned, Chinese clients are more open-minded than elsewhere, he said, "because we are going through a really unprecedented cultural transition today, transformation in China". "Nobody really knows what contemporary Chinese architecture, cities should be. That gives architects the opportunity to be involved more, to really suggest possibilities." The blistering speed of development and construction in China is a double-edged sword, Chang said. On the one hand, he asserted, "the productivity of a Chinese architect is like a thousand times more than a European guy." "But the problem is that the quality certainly is not a thousand times better, for me, compared with some of the European countries, compared with also Japan, which are on the forefront of architectural design." Chang said Chinese architects still have a long way to go. "I don't think we're in a position -- 'we' meaning Chinese architects -- to be terribly optimistic, unless we really improve upon the quality of the design and construction, and are really able to formulate our own design agenda," he said. "I don't think we're going to be part of this forefront."
