Beijing Urban Expansion

From 1959-1983-1991-2000
Beijing 1990-2020
“Carrying capacity” of environmental resources such as land and wa-
ter, [we have exact number for bottleneck!18 million] which can limit
the city’s future growth and urban scale.

source:Shenghe Liu, Sylvia Prieler, Saptial Patterns and

Dynamic Mechanisms of Urba Land Use Growth in China:
Case studies in Beijing and shanghai, 2002
MOD- Market-driven organic development Beijing is growing as a pancake
Development zones
sprawl
Trans Sprawl
GRID
LOCK
Beijing Gravity
DEFINITION OF URBAN GRAVITY + DIAGRAM
No doubt that one of the goals is to improve urban quality, but with the addendum of a mar-
ket logic, the state hopes to decentralise a number of areas, attract foreign investment and
displace central populations. In recent decades, the city has rapidly expanded, re-appropriat-
ing industrial areas for commercial use and new residential neighbourhoods. The city centre
now spills well over the Fourth Ring Road in all directions. Building size increases towards
the periphery, dramatically changing the appearance of downtown Beijing. The exploding
urban scale and building speed correlates with the arrival of the inner-city highways. Though
the concept of a ring and radial road system was created in the 1950s and the construction of
the second ring road started as early as the 1960s, rings two to six were in reality all built in
the last twenty years. The layout was thought to be an ideal transportation system to support
the planned urban pattern. Highway related typologies distinct to China and Beijing were
erected alongside the new roads in the form of big slabs and cross-shaped apartment tow-
ers. The Fourth Ring Road would be the edge of the city centre, the Fifth Ring Road would
link the suburbs and the Sixth Ring Road was designed to connect the satellite towns. The
combined investment in this peripheral (inner-suburban) zone aims to shift Beijing’s gravity
point to the north, north-east, retaining the 62 km2 within the Second Ring Road as an his-
toric core of monuments. If successful, these scattered districts will fully mature to become
the new functioning centre of Beijing. But not unlike other proposals concerning Beijing,
the reality quickly surpasses the goals for efficient infrastructure and transport. The original
planned polycentric pattern neglected the impact of market forces and sociocultural prefer-
ences. It largely resembled the post-war American dream of a house with modern amenities
and more living space. But in the Beijing version, significant urban development did not
reach the satellite towns until the late 1990s, when the municipal government built radial
highways and created some university and industrial zones. Even so, this public infrastruc-
ture lags far behind urbanisation and is still concentrated in the centre, presenting a kind of
infrasprawl discontinuous with the peripheral investments in architecture. Thus, the physi-
cal pattern of urbanization around Beijing largely remains monocentric in character.
NEURAL MAPS 2000-2015

Source: ‘ An Artificial-Neural-Network-Based Constrained CA Model for Simulating

Urban Growth and Its Application’, Qingfeng Guan, Liming Wang,
 Gradient of real estates in Beijing

Industrial land
price gradient

Residential land General land price

price gradient gradient
Beijing 2020--Congested
The Liang & Chen plan was put forward by Liang Sicheng of Qinghua University and Chen Zhanx-
iang (Charlie Cheng), head of the layout department of the Beijing Metropolis Plan Committee.
This plan pointed out many difficulties and disadvantages in the original proposal. First, construc-
tion of the municipal centre inside the Old City would considerably increase the population of the
rest of the city because the city centre residents would have to be evacuated and the density of the
population in the Old City was very high. In fact, if new construction replaced the existing hous-
ing, approximately 130,000 houses would be destroyed and over 182,000 residents would have to
relocate. Secondly, if a lot of modern buildings were constructed in the centre of Old Beijing City,
they would completely change the layout of the hutongs and destroy their appearance. Moreover,
if a lot of new buildings were constructed on the main streets, the flow and complexity of traffic
would soon increase. At the same time, the long distances between different government offices
and between working areas and living quarters would result in traffic congestion, overcrowding on
public transport and excessive commutes.

Move people out doesn’t work

1. people in center: space efficient

- small space
- no cars
- no commutes
2. to where?

3. cookie model
This will increase commutes
move urban function out
- administrative/ govenment offices
- liang & chen plan

source: Alain Bertaud

Black hole
Market-driven Organic Development lies at the heart of a economically driven map of the
city. These existing models point to similar results as the bakery analogy. The center func-
tions as a gravitational force that becomes hyper-saturated to the point where increasing
space demand pushes out land development. Middle-class residents are lured to the sub-
urbs, the rich escape unbearable congestion and pollution and climbing rents equally force
migrants out. An additional force created by Township and Village Enterprises pull people
towards the periphery. As result, the center becomes a [Black Hole]
source: Alain Bertaud, 1990
source: DCF 2006
 RUS
North-East Development
- Wang Jing GREEN BUBBLES
- Tian Tongyuang
- Jiu Xianqiao TIAN TONG YUAN AND DONG XIAO KOU WORK-
- Zhong Guancun ING TOGETHER RUS
- CBD + Olympic
Green Belt

- the largest greenbelt in the world

- very little real green
The second planned Green Belt: this area is 1000 meter away from the first green belt.
and the surface area is 1650km2 with 1061km2 green
surface.

Beijing Urban Plan 2004-2020

The First planned Green Belt, 80% has already gone. the area is
around 240km2 with 125km2 green space.
BJ 2020 vs. Dream

Beijing urban plan 2020 Beijing Dream 2020

THOMAS BEIJING DENSITY
Green Edge

+
653km2 within the
5th ring
subway+existing satellites,
which called greenedge

within 5th ring

the range of subways and existing

satellites, which is around 930km2 and
called green edge
Dragon Rail
Beijing-Tianjing