Urban Dialogue: Exploring International Metropolis Construction and Housing

Author: Liu Zhifeng
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2007-02-01
Features: This is a research report on a research topic, a report that objectively explores the laws of a major historical stage our country, society, and nation are undergoing. It is also a research work closely tied to reality. People say that in the early 1980s of the 20th century, the pursuit of families was "watches, bicycles, sewing machines"; in the early 1990s, it was "color TVs, refrigerators, washing machines," and entering the 21st century, it became "owning houses and cars." How times have changed. Once, the common people and ordinary urban residents of China, who had come from a "poor and backward" and "large-scale and public-owned" past, could now consider "livable" as their pursuit, and people regarded owning assets as their life's aspiration. This is a earth-shattering transformation. In the early 1980s of the 20th century, the per capita living space of urban residents in China was less than 5 square meters, but by the end of 2006, it had exceeded 27 square meters. Over this span of more than two decades, although the population of urban residents in China had grown from 190 million to 570 million, with the urban population increasing by nearly 200%, the per capita living space had expanded several times over. It is easy to infer that in just over two decades, we have built how many houses! We have created a world miracle, a historical miracle. On one hand, countless skyscrapers are continuously rising in all cities across China; on the other hand, social conflicts caused by land expropriation and demolition, as well as growing dissatisfaction due to continuously rising housing prices, are accelerating. The housing security system, the laws of housing price fluctuations, the order of market operations, the constraints of resource shortages, and macro-control policies have become the focus of attention for the entire society. We face new challenges. We need to learn, we need to draw on the experience of others, we need to summarize and refine our own practices. That is why this research topic was chosen. The research team faces the following question: What are the differences between the rapid urban development and large-scale housing construction in contemporary China and those in other countries, especially developed ones? A fundamental understanding became the starting point of this research: what China faces is not just an improvement in the housing conditions of the people, but rather a high tide of urbanization accompanied by industrialization. We have moved past the era of "sentencing educated youth to the countryside," and we are now facing the era of "transferring surplus rural labor to urban areas." Starting with an examination of the laws of urban development, we observe, reflect, explore, and seek solutions to housing issues. This is the thread of the book. We have set our focus on international mega-cities, selecting Shanghai domestically and Tokyo, New York, and London abroad as comparative subjects. Tokyo, New York, and London, as international mega-cities representing Asia, North America, and Europe, are also typical cities with different development histories and economic development stages (Tokyo: 50 years, New York: 100 years, London: 150 years). The three cities themselves possess distinct characteristics: the "Greater London" economic circle centered around London has 130 languages, New York has a high concentration of finance and business, and Tokyo is a rapidly urbanizing international mega-city. Through comparisons with several mature international mega-cities, we aim to explore the objective laws and international experiences of mega-cities during the historical processes of industrialization, urbanization, internationalization, and modernization, and to summarize and the intrinsic connections and general patterns between the economic output, asset total, degree of internationalization, population, industrial structure, and urban construction, architectural structure, planning and functional zoning, and housing systems of mega-cities. This research is, in fact, a major theoretical foundation for the construction and development of China's mega-cities, the development and improvement of the real estate industry, the real estate market, and real estate policies. The readers of this report are researchers and policymakers in real estate policies, faculty members in real estate-related fields, senior executives in real estate companies, and all those who wish to understand the laws of real estate development.