JOINED UP THINKING
Beijing is set to expand hugely by absorbing its neighbours to become a 130 million-person megacity. examines the plan’s logic
How China plans to tackle the problem of population growth in Beijing
From now on, people won’t have to ask which province you are from – they will just ask which ring you are in.” So read one online comment cited by China Daily in response to news that Beijing was to begin work on a seventh ring road. Set to open in 2017, the latest – and largest – of the concentric highways that loop the Chinese capital will be more than 940km in length, with about 90 per cent running through neighbouring Hebei province. As well as further extending Beijing’s boundary, the expressway is being billed as a central structure of a colossal 130 million-person megalopolis. The Capital Economic Circle (nicknamed “Jing-Jin-Ji”) will see Beijing absorb eight large cities in Hebei province and link the Chinese capital with Tianjin – itself one of the country’s largest metropolitan areas, with some 14 million residents.
Ostensibly, the plan is one of necessity. Rapid urbanisation has placed a huge strain on the capital’s infrastructure, services and economy. It suffers from water shortages, traffic problems, soaring property prices and a well-documented battle with pollution. With about 600,000 internal migrants arriving in the city each year, the government is now backing a Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei megalopolis, which it believes is the most effective way to curb the seemingly unsustainable rate of expansion. But rather than becoming a megacity in the sense of being a continuous urban area, planners see Jing-Jin-Ji encompassing an interconnected network of cities that operate as a single entity. Transport infrastructure features heavily, with an additional 9,000km of expressways and 9,500km of rail lines expected to be built by 2020. New business zones and residential areas will also be constructed to enable a better distribution of the population across the 216,000 sq km region.
Under the government’s strategy, each area of the megalopolis will take on its own specialised roles to encourage industries – especially heavy-polluting ones – to flow out from Beijing. It is the capital that will reap most of the benefits, according to Chen Chen, architect and partner at urban design firm Remix. “For Beijing itself, it is definitely a good idea because it moves some of the negative elements of the city out to Hebei and Tianjin,” she says. “This means we will see more clean and innovative industries headquartered in Beijing, with all the production lines and manufacturing shifting outwards.”
Few details have been disclosed since the plan was formally announced in April, but it appears Hebei will act as an industrial satellite with affordable housing, while Tianjin will expand in sectors such as shipping, logistics and technology, offering lower operational and labour costs than in the capital.
The cities' collective economic clout will attract investment
Where sectors overlap, different cities will take responsibility for parts of the production chain. It is hoped the creation of distinct economic functions will reduce competition for resources, increase productivity and free up Beijing to act as a centre for culture, politics, international business and innovation.
Although critics believe the strategy merely moves problems, rather than solving them, officials argue that balancing the economies of north-east China will benefit the region as a whole. What’s more, it is hoped the cities’ collective economic clout will boost the area’s global standing and attract more outside investment. Already accounting for about 10 per cent of the country’s GDP, the region’s joint output will surpass that of New York and Tokyo by 2025.
Such optimism stems from the success of similar projects elsewhere in China, Chen says. “This idea of a megacity is about the north-east trying to catch up with fast-emerging city clusters in the Pearl River and Yangtze River deltas,” she said. “They each managed to develop in an evenly distributed manner, with a high GDP across both areas. But so far Beijing has been sucking the resources from surrounding cities and has become an obstacle to their development.”
What distinguishes the challenge in the north-east from projects in the south is the huge development gap between Beijing and elsewhere. This is particularly the case for Hebei, a poor steel-making province that is heavily dependent on coal and unable to stem the flow of talent to the capital. Given this disparity, the project may exacerbate Beijing’s problems, according to Jan Wampler, professor of architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
“If the government goes ahead then it is only going to increase the number of people moving to Beijing hoping – or thinking – they are going to find a better job,” he says. “There is already a floating population of somewhere between 1.5 and three million people living ‘underground’ in the city, and it will only get worse.”
Convincing firms and individuals to move away from the capital will require more than just efficient transport. Tianjin has been linked to Beijing via high-speed rail since 2008 (the 30-minute journey is much faster than commuting across the capital), yet it has failed to attract the interest planners had hoped for.
The city’s unfulfilled promise is symbolised by its 47-building replica of Wall Street, Yujiapu Financial District, which lies empty and, in parts, unfinished. Tianjin may continue to experience above-average GDP growth but it has accrued huge amounts of debt in the process, and there is scant evidence that it has relieved any of the pressure on Beijing.
The fate of the megalopolis may instead be decided by the ability to integrate the region’s “software” – meaning its communication networks, services and governance. But if this is not dependent on physical connectivity, then building up the capacity of smaller third-tier cities in other parts of country may offer a more sustainable solution, Wampler says.
“Software that interconnects is the answer, but not just for these three areas,” he says. “If you bolster the communication systems across the country, then you don’t have to be near Beijing to be connected.”
Nonetheless, after decades of indecision, the project now appears to be in full motion. With political observers suggesting that President Xi Jinping sees the megalopolis as a crucial part of his administration’s legacy, the north-east of China is set to transform radically over the next decade. Whether the cluster eases or worsens the burden on the capital remains to be seen.
Convincing firms and individuals to move from the capital will require more than efficient transport