Urban Frenzy

[img]http://www.turenscape.com/upload/news/200514141118227.jpg[/img] 　　Beijing Today meets a man who thinks the first step in China’s city planning education should be an apology from architect Rem Kohlhaas。 　　‘The famous Western architects – Kohlhaas, Andrews – have to make a decision.They must know that a building is inappropriate for China,but they also must come up with the most outrageous design or they won’t win the contract. So they are asked to choose – money and fame or a responsible attitude.’ 　　‘We can’t mimic others,because we have a different climate and lifestyle to New York or Europe. We have a different culture and should express it. Even a different sense of colour.’ 　　An imposing black wood desk is littered with wooden mushrooms, padded cushions. A medal from the university of Chicago rests beside a spectrum of magic markers, while Professor Kongjian Yu sits and talks about the biggest turning point in Chinese history since May 4th 1919. Placing his tea cup precariously between stacks of printed paper and a couple of laptop computers, Prof. Yu tells me that the time is now. Yu believes that, once again, China is experiencing a crisis of national-cultural identity. The issue is the relationship between the people and their homeland. 　　Having received his doctorate from Harvard’s Graduate School of Design in 1995, Yu spent to years practising in Los Angeles with the SWA Group, before returning to China. As well as founding the Graduate School of Landscape Architecture at Peking University, Yu is also founder and President of Turenscape, the largest landscape and urban design company in China. And he finds much about Beijing’s landscape to trouble him. 　　Professor Yu believes that Beijing is in the process of a “city beautiful” movement a term first used to describe The Chicago Exhibition of 1893 ?and that Beijing’s urbanization mirrors events in North America a century ago. Like China today, the US became a rich nation “overnight”, and wanted to demonstrate this to thorld. “They bought things from Europe, imported art, exported exhibitions to show off their wealth. And they looked at what they had seen as powerful the great imperial European cities – and they mimicked them.” 　　Today China wants to show the world its strength, its power. “Here landscape, architecture and the urban environment become the tools to show off – like a peacock. When you dress up you try tohow off your identity. Your values. Your aesthetic taste.” 　　In his rapid, easy manner, Yu tells how America finally realized that the city beautiful movement was costing huge sums while creating a few pretty buildings and a lot of social problems. Theorists began to talk of a “vernacular landscape” one that would reflect the true native identity. But this was almost 80 years later. And the process is ongoing. Yu feels that China is repeating the same mistakes and failing to learn the lessons of the past, “The identity of today’s Chinese is not yet found,” he adds. 　　Yu sees three distinct identities struggling for space in Beijing today. The first is the classical European style, which the Americans also copied. This romantic style comes mainly from France, Italy and England. “The style of Kings imperial, foreboding and outdated,” he says. The second is the “modernstyle. “China is a rapidly modernizing country, so we want to reflect this. We look to what we think is modern New York, the big American cities. And that is modern, but it’s modern imperialism. The image of a modern apitalist society, with palaces for the capitalist emperors. It reflects America, but not China. Kohlhaas’ CCTV building falls into this category. Or rather, a Chinese feudalist emperor in a modern dress.” 　　Thirdly, as China becomes a great nation on a global scale, many look to reimpose the grandeur of the past. “We have 5,000 years of history. Many want to rebuild the imperial image of China that’s why so many buildings feature marbe and dragons. This has happened before with ancient nations that have seen a city beautiful movement – Italy and Germany in the 1930stried to recapture old glories for a new age.” And none of these three schools represent what Yu sees as “the true identity of the modern Chinese. 　　The problem with the city beautiful movement is that it is interested in cosmetic form over function ?great buildings at the expense of a well functioning city. 　　In his keynote speech to the Beijing Architecture Biennale, Professor Alexander Garvin of Yale University and author of The American City: What Works, What Doesn’, stated that China is far from the first nation to fall into this trap. “When it comes to great city building, the solution is planning. The reason successes are so often overlooked is ecause when a problem is solved it’s forgotten,” he says. Good planning, he adds, is the key ingredient to a city’s “safety, utility and quality of life. 　　Most major nations have experienced planning disasters. And now they’re spending big to correct them. But China comes to the table with a blank slate, and yet while Europe and even the US are looking to more efficient forms of public transport to improve quality of life and limit polution, China is embracing the car. “20 years ago we had a very green transport system, with excellent cycle paths. Now we combat traffic problems by building wider roads, so we have not one lane jams, but four or five lne ones,” says Professor Yu. 　　50 years ago, America and Europe were channelizing their rivers. Now they are spending millions to dig them back up, while China begins to channelize hers. “There are no natural rivers in Bejing now, while the West is finding that natural rivers, far from being a waste of space, can contribute to the success of local business, and encourage tourism. This is the ecological approach.” Yu talks about the “BiDig Project” in Boston for which he won an urban design award, with a local design firm in 2002. “It was simple, we dug down and put part of the highway underground, leaving the open air streets for public transport, clists and pedestrians. For daily use. This kind of project is worth imitating.” 　　Rather than lay the blame with specific individuals, Professor Yu believes that the system has evolved in a way that makes coherent planning difficult. “Right now half of China’s richest people make their money from the land. The process of urbanization, where people can draw a line and say ‘this land is developable, and therefore saleabl means that a lot of people are becoming hugely wealthy overnight.” Says Yu, “so these people get this huge profit, become rich and powerful, then they don’t know how to spend it. So each of them wants to build the highest, most expene building. A luxury plaza, a central street ?just to have a beautiful thing without considering its function. Or how the city will work.” 　　Chinese cities operate a zoning system, similar to that of the old USSR and the USA. And the US has experienced the problems that China is now seeing. Land is sold according to a plan, within defined “lines”. One area will be sold as a real estate zone, the next a commercial zoneSo the city emerges piece by piece, with little consideration for the organic unit. The potential is for a city that favours the car over green transport and thus becomes polluted. And a city that segregates rich and poor areas into zones that may be separated by just a retail area. 　　Elsewhere in the world, this has led to ugly, forgotten districts which promote only poverty and social unrest. “China needs n intellectual movement to go forward,” says Yu. “We need to make the decision process more scientific and more democratic.?Y 　　Yu doesn’t believe that the city authorities are yet receiving adequate advice, from their ow people or from the foreign architects they bring in. “The people with power have an idea of what they want; a grand building, a unique symbol. This might not be the best thing for the city, but then the famous Western rchitects – Kohlhaas, Andrews – have to make a decision. They must know that a building is inappropriate for China, but they also muscome up with the most outrageous design or they won’t win the contract. So they are asked to choose money and fame or a responsible attitude.” 　　“At this stage what China really needs is education.” Yu says, “We don’t have a modern identity. We need to understand what’s good and bad, what’s imperialistic and what’s capitalist. What is for thupstart nation’ and what is for the people. We need to know the difference between formalmodernism and spiritual modernism. The Western architects should be coming here as teachers, not just to take the money...especially the big ones, like Kohlhaas. They should be setting an example of what is suitable for this nation.” 　　To this effect, Yu has presented ideas to 600 mayors as part of this education. But with the big contracts still going to companies from overseas, the tide has not yet turned. Work began in October on the new CCTV building designed by Rem Kohlhaas and Yu uses this to illustrate all that he feels is wrong with the city beautiful movement. “It’s formally modern, but spiritually imperialistic...a very capitalist building. more functional building could have been built for a tenth of the cost, and with billions here in China without access to formal schooling this is against democracy and the scientific way. Instead of using the most simple method to solve a problem, the CCTV building is a misuse of technology to show off.” 　　Professor Yu believes that the first step in China’s education should be an apology from Kohlhaas. “Of course, Kohlhaas was asked tbuild this, and I don’t want to criticize his talent if he hadn’t taken the contract, maybe some worse architect would have. But when Einstein developed nuclear power, he sent out a message when he admitted his regret I would like to see Kohlhaas set this example to other architects and planners in China and admit the building is unsuitable for Beijing.” 　　With education, Yu believes that China will come to see its own path. “We can’mimic others, because we have a different climate and lifestyle to New York or Europe. We have a different culture and should express it. Even a different sense of colour. Tomorrow, we will have the self confidence to express ourselves. Hopefully before the destruction of the unique identity of this place and our people.” 　　And people are starting to listen. Yu has received invitations from many real estate developers to design projects all over the country, and although his single-minded nature has meant that these projects have not always been 100 percent successful, it also means he won’t give up。