changes, and ambitious efforts to create sustainable places with better access to technology, financial centres or culture. Emerging economies are providing most of the biggest developments, because their needs are often most urgent and they are generally more willing to think big and do away with the old. By contrast, in the West, the tendency is to preserve, renew and infill cities – partly because of a lack of space, but also because public opinion tends to be less prepared to embrace new construction. In the developing world, there is a desire for growth
and modernity – though this comes at a price, according to Dr George Martine, co-author of a 2010 study on urbanisation published by the International Institute for Environment and Development and the UN Population Fund (UNFPA). “Massive urban growth in developing countries loom as some of the most critical determinants of economic, social and ecological wellbeing in the 21st century,” he says.
East Asian tigers As in so many things, China is leading the way when it comes to big developments. Since 1978, it has added roughly 500 new cities to the landscape and it already has 160 cities of more than a million people (by comparison, Europe has 35). Over the next 20 years, the percentage of Chinese expected to live in cities will grow from roughly 50 per cent today to 70 per cent. By 2040, the urban population is forecast to expand by 400 million – about 15 million people per year. “What’s happening in China is the rapid urbanisation that we have already seen in Japan and the tiger economies,” says Mark Harrison, senior technical director for Atkins’ urban planning consultancy in Beijing. “It’s the same as what happened in Britain and Europe following the Industrial Revolution, and in America in the last century. We’re seeing a rapid urbanisation, and a mass migration of people to urban areas.”
The tremendous growth in China and elsewhere in East
Asia is leading to a new phenomenon: mega city regions, where cities coalesce to form uninterrupted urban stretches. Examples include: the Hong Kong-Shenzhen-Guangzhou region in China, which is home to 120 million people according to a recent UN report; the Nagoya-Osaka-Kyoto- Kobe corridor in Japan – 60 million people; and the Malaysia- Singapore area. “These regions are economically sound, but they do pose many challenges. For example, how do you reflect local or regional identity in these very large areas, if only from an aesthetic point of view?”Harrison says. Another big challenge in China is planning for a society that is evolving so rapidly. “China is changing from a socialist to a market-socialist system, so that changes the way the cities are. If they weren’t exporting to the West, for example, there wouldn’t need to be these massive
590
million people will be living in cities in India by 2030, up from 340 million in 2008. Thirty per cent of the population already lives in urban centres. Over 90 million households will qualify as middle class by then, up from 22 million today. Urbanisation in India is going to be paramount.
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