Urban Design Practice in "Instant New Towns"

Abstract

Shenzhen is a lengendary city booming out from a small fishing village within ten years. It is situated at the south end of China, along eastern side of the Pearl River opening to the South China Sea. As one of the earliest of four Special Economic Zones in China since 198 1, Shenzhen has enjoyed a set of privileged economic policies and turned into an energetic metropolis with population of over three million. According to the strategic planning, Shenzhen will expand to an area of nearly 2000 square kilometers from 300 square kilometers right now. The local government seeks to realize 100% urbanization in Shenzhen in a short time. In other words, the whole outskirts and rural area will be urbanized. In the conprehensive plannning, the surburb, formerly Baoan county, is becoming another two districts (Baoan and Longgang) besides the existing three districts (Luohu, Futian, and Nanshan). The grouped structure of urban layout in the planning attempts to organize the present villages and towns in the outskii into 8 groups (4 in each district), which are assigned different priority urban bctions such as transportation, communication, industry, tourism, district centre, etc. Generalization of the project of Longgang District Planning Our project is concerned with the zone planning ofthe central group in Longgang district. It consists of Longgang, Pingdi, and Pingdi Centre, covers an area of over 180 square kilometers, and holds population of 200,000. According to the strategic plan, the group is to develop into the future admistrative, commercial, and cultural center of Longgang district. The study of urban design is one important field in our project.