Beijing’s first green belt—a 50-year long chinese planning story
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- land-10-00969-v2
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This article traces the development process of Beijing’s First Green Belt from its origins in the 1950s, to its reinterpretation in the 1980s/1990s and its implementation in the 1990s/2000s. We identify three-time phases and important milestones, which kept the green belt idea alive, developed it and contextualized it in relation to the historical background. This article shows that the first green belt project in Beijing was a continuing process of changing functions and ranges. Its adaptability to variations followed the political changes and reflected the socio-economic dynamics, which secured its longevity. Different ideas shaped the plan and its link to mega events like the Olympic Games and environmental problems accelerated the implementation, but the shortage of funding and absence of legislation led to a compromised result. The case is an interesting example of how a long-term project transforms over and with time, but also for the gap between planning ambitions and actual urban development, illustrating past and contemporary urban planning in the context of a fast-developing country.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 969 |
| Journal | Land |
| Volume | 10 |
| Issue number | 9 |
| Number of pages | 14 |
| ISSN | 2073-445X |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - Sep 2021 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:
The implementation of the green belt was supported by several executive orders from the city government. One of the most important was published in 1994, executive order 1994 [7] “The proposal of greening construction in green belt”. According to this order, the actual green area in the green belt was only 20 km2 in 1994, far less than the target of 140 km2 [50]. In the same order, another policy was announced, “Green Supports Green”, which soon became a guiding principle. This policy responded to the new condition in the area and was considered as the actual start of the green belt development. As the land price rose sharply along with the economic growth in the 1990s [51], the cost of purchasing land for building the green belt became much higher, beyond the affordability of the governments. This policy aimed at raising funding by a real estate approach, without acquiring financial support from the government. The basic idea was that the sub-local governments (mainly villages and a few towns) got the permission to operate real estate development and built high-rise settlements in certain limited areas. The newly built housing should be used mainly for allocating farmers and the rest for sale in order to cover
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 by the authors. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland.
- Green belt, Master plan, Planning history, Planning policy, Urban containment
Research areas
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