# Shanghai,China（上海,中国） - Astonishing metropolis



## Foglio1986 (Dec 7, 2007)

Shanghai is the Chinese biggest city ，17,780,000 residents, are very huge and the modern metropolis

*Shanghai,Part II*

*Shanghai,Part III*

*Puxi area* 









*Pudong area*


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## Foglio1986 (Dec 7, 2007)




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## Foglio1986 (Dec 7, 2007)




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## Foglio1986 (Dec 7, 2007)




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## nedolessej197 (Oct 24, 2006)

tes photos sont spectaculaires


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## mbuildings (May 6, 2007)

wow..............stunning skyline!!!!!!!!


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## WinoSoul (Sep 14, 2005)

Awesome! I love shanghai!


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## foadi (Feb 15, 2006)

Foglio1986 said:


>


interesting. that kinda looks like panda mall in chengdu


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## Franky (Nov 27, 2005)

Shanghai Rocks! I wish the west was more like that.


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## FREKI (Sep 27, 2005)

Wonderful!


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## WolfHound (Jun 28, 2006)

Awesome pics I'm hoping to go to Shanghai this summer.


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## Foglio1986 (Dec 7, 2007)

Tomorrow will have more pictures


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## Brisbaner21 (Jul 17, 2007)

Really like these pictures. Shanghai is changing very rapidly, but I like they way they are doing it, they are not trying to out-pace everyone like Dubai. They are doing it at their own pace, and things are really starting to look good.


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## Universal Soulja (Mar 16, 2007)

17,780,000 people in one city Amazing, Amazing Skyline also, the only thing that worries me, is if there is a major Earthquake all of that glass will tumble.


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## JoSin (Sep 11, 2005)

The good thing is Shanghai doesnt lie on the fault lines. So there wont be any earthquakes. Shanghai is great! The chinese should be proud!


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## Foglio1986 (Dec 7, 2007)




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## kix111 (Jun 14, 2007)

the best photo ever, by Charlie Xia

http://www.flickr.com/photos/charliexia/
http://www.photo.net/photos/Charlie.Xia




























by nicky frmo xitek










by fengniao 


















from kaiser


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## Daniel_Portugal (Sep 24, 2005)

best shangai thread ever!

this city is such a huge metropolis! and his charisma it is true, not like dubai or panama.

i love asian very big cities. Shangai and Tokyo rocks! my two favourite asian cities


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## oliver999 (Aug 4, 2006)

Daniel_Portugal said:


> best shangai thread ever!
> 
> this city is such a huge metropolis! and his charisma it is true, not like dubai or panama.
> 
> i love asian very big cities. Shangai and Tokyo rocks! my two favourite asian cities


thanks!
this is a highrise forest:cheers:


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## Foglio1986 (Dec 7, 2007)

Daniel_Portugal said:


> best shangai thread ever!
> 
> this city is such a huge metropolis! and his charisma it is true, not like dubai or panama.
> 
> i love asian very big cities. Shangai and Tokyo rocks! my two favourite asian cities


Welcome you to come the Shanghai traveling


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## RON-E (Sep 25, 2007)

these are amazing pictures!!!!!!!!!!!!!


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## ZZ-II (May 10, 2006)

Shanghai is Awesome!!! but still not enough towers


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## wonder why (Dec 22, 2007)

i have finished watching the series of "american pie " , i want to know ,does the film describe the real american college life ?


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## snow is red (May 7, 2007)

Real American college life in Shanghai ?


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## wonder why (Dec 22, 2007)

hi,everybody. i am a chinese college student ,i want to make more foreign friends . my MSN: [email protected] expect to make friends with you...
PS: I can only speak one foreign language:English


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## wonder why (Dec 22, 2007)

*i just want to know, is the film real ?*



02tonyl said:


> Real American college life in Shanghai ?


HAPPY NEW YEAR....


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## Foglio1986 (Dec 7, 2007)

Everybody Happy New Year


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## Foglio1986 (Dec 7, 2007)




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## Foglio1986 (Dec 7, 2007)




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## winterhood (Apr 20, 2005)

by Railboy


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## wonder why (Dec 22, 2007)

中国元年的提法，自然是中国世纪的序幕涵义，海内外华人感到祖国蒸蒸日上，自然是感到兴奋自豪，但是，这也引发了海外华人的一些思维盲点和误区，值得警惕。

　　有人说，出国的人更爱国，因为距离的作用出现，游子思乡之情的催化，但是，另一方面，出国的更比中国国内的人更盲目看待中国的崛起，产生更大的骄傲情绪。比如，中国国内五成以上的民众并没有中国是超级强国的感觉，但海外华人，尤其是大陆的华人，则认为中国是全球最伟大的国家，任何的批评都是别有用心，赞美是唯一的选择，这种盲目自大的观察角度会形成很大的心理负担，既有对去国的内咎，也有对新居住地融入的抗拒，因为过度美化原居地，肯定会挑剔现居地，结果造成离了旧岸又靠不了新岸的尴尬。

　　不仅如此，移民心态的不正，也导致思维方式的错位。在此仅举一例，新移民在评论移民国家的内政外交时，用的竟然是原居住国标准立场和角度，从来不去认真待调查一下新国家大部分民众的想法，结果当然是感觉很孤立，感觉政府没有关心或者听取自己的意见，从而很气忿，更难以融入，变得更为偏激。

　　中国强大绝对是好事，对移民的无形支持也很大，但中国并不需要海外华人的盲目赞美，相反，强大起来的中国，最需要海外华人本着爱心和关心，去指出中国的不够之处，并把外国的好经验带给中国，让中国改进得更好。说得更透彻一点，在中国成为世界超强的过程中，需要诤友，而非奉承者。还有，出国后一味赞美祖国，咒骂新居地的移民，是否有点逻辑混乱？因为别人自要问：你为何选择出国？（


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## skycity007 (Jun 11, 2007)

that is shanghai!

wonderful~~


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## Ore (Jun 6, 2006)

WOWWW Awesome, Shanghai rocks


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## Falubaz (Nov 20, 2004)

it's really very interesting city. have somebody some pics of 'old' Shanghai?


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## little universe (Jan 3, 2008)

It looks like that Shanghai will become the city which New York and Tokyo combined~~the skyscraper number will equal New York, while the multi-centre urban structure will be more like Tokyo.


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## staff (Oct 23, 2004)

little universe said:


> the skyscraper number will equal New York


It passed New York quite a while ago in fact.


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## oliver999 (Aug 4, 2006)

shanghai needs another 500 40stoery towres.


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## Alexriga (Nov 25, 2007)

Wow, such a beauty.


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## Dario (Mar 4, 2006)

Shangai is just AMAZING.


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## Johnor (Jan 8, 2008)

@Foglio1986 

I have with interrest looked at all you threads about china, and I have to the conclusion that it all looks like american Las Vegas with a chinese Touche. Are they no historical downtowns in chinese bigger cities or have they tore down everything and replaced them with skyscrapers? Apart from a couple of lonely islands of historical buildings there seems to be nothing old and historical to see? 

A question: do chinese really hate their culture and tradition that much?


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## oliver999 (Aug 4, 2006)

Johnor said:


> @Foglio1986
> 
> I have with interrest looked at all you threads about china, and I have to the conclusion that it all looks like american Las Vegas with a chinese Touche. Are they no historical downtowns in chinese bigger cities or have they tore down everything and replaced them with skyscrapers? Apart from a couple of lonely islands of historical buildings there seems to be nothing old and historical to see?
> 
> A question: do chinese really hate their culture and tradition that much?


i'll answer your question.
1,beijing ,nanjing do has a lot of histrical buildings downtown.
2,some large cities in ancient times now become small\poor\isolated cities in these days,on the other hand some small fish valleges become rich large cities today, such as shanghai ,shenzhen,ningbo.
3,chinese history is a history of civil war, 80% histrical building distroyed.
4,chinese building mostly built in brick, not huge stones like greece and ancient europe.


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## Prosciutto (Jun 28, 2006)

wow - amazing pictures of a HUGE city.


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## zergcerebrates (Jan 23, 2004)

Johnor said:


> @Foglio1986
> 
> I have with interrest looked at all you threads about china, and I have to the conclusion that it all looks like american Las Vegas with a chinese Touche. Are they no historical downtowns in chinese bigger cities or have they tore down everything and replaced them with skyscrapers? Apart from a couple of lonely islands of historical buildings there seems to be nothing old and historical to see?
> 
> A question: do chinese really hate their culture and tradition that much?



To say that "ALL" Chinese cities look like Las Vegas is very inaccurate, and seems like you dont really know what Chinese cities are like as I first thought. First of all certain Chinese cities do have a few tacky buildings built during the early 90's which is true, but there are many buildings around China like in Shanghai,Beijing,Nanjing or Shenzhen that is quite classy and modern. The only Chinese cities that I can think of that truly resembles Las Vegas is Macau. 

China still has a lot of the traditional and ancient buildings a few examples are the ones in Beijing,Xian,Hangzhou, and Suzhou. The materials used in ancient Chinese architecture is mainly wood and as we all might of guessed it wouldn't last over 5000yrs. Over the years of the Chinese history there are endless amounts of war and structures get destroyed, natural disaster and of course aging.

Chinese don't hate their culture, but rather quite proud of it. The revival of Hanfu, keeping the Chinese traditions, customs and holidays are examples. China is also actively promoting its culture(including films) all over the world and the Chinese language and literature is certainly making a huge impact all over. Why do Chinese establishments in USA,Australia,Canada,England or anywhere else maintain the use of Chinese characters? Why are there still Chinatowns? Why do modern Chinese youths learn mandarin? If we "Hate" our culture you wouldn't be seeing any of those now would we?


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## staff (Oct 23, 2004)

^^
Don't even bother. Comparing any Chinese city to Las Vegas, and asking if Chinese people "hate their culture" is an obvious indication of trolling.


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## Johnor (Jan 8, 2008)

staff said:


> ^^
> Don't even bother. Comparing any Chinese city to Las Vegas, and asking if Chinese people "hate their culture" is an obvious indication of trolling.


Well, since I am interrested in asian architechture and I was interested to see how chinese cities look like, I took a day of and went throug a lot of galleries here. And almost all chinese galleries on this pages shows skylines that could have belonged to almost any american city. Sorry about Las Vegas. I should have said Denver or Atlanta intstead.
It would be nice then if there could be skylines and photographs of historical houses. Now I get the impression that chinese cities consists of modern and post-modern highrises. 

I am sorry if hate is a strong word, but what I try to say that compared to european cities where the old town or the down town the most important cultural aspect of the city it seems that there are no historical downtown pictures. I am talking about Chongqing, Dalian, Hangzhou, Nanjing.....

Prove me wrong. Put some photographs of chinese skyscrapers and chinese historical buildings. For an example in the mexico city thread you get both.


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## snow is red (May 7, 2007)

zergcerebrates said:


> To say that "ALL" Chinese cities look like Las Vegas is very inaccurate, and seems like you dont really know what Chinese cities are like as I first thought. First of all certain Chinese cities do have a few tacky buildings built during the early 90's which is true, but there are many buildings around China like in Shanghai,Beijing,Nanjing or Shenzhen that is quite classy and modern. The only Chinese cities that I can think of that truly resembles Las Vegas is Macau.
> 
> China still has a lot of the traditional and ancient buildings a few examples are the ones in Beijing,Xian,Hangzhou, and Suzhou. The materials used in ancient Chinese architecture is mainly wood and as we all might of guessed it wouldn't last over 5000yrs. Over the years of the Chinese history there are endless amounts of war and structures get destroyed, natural disaster and of course aging.
> 
> Chinese don't hate their culture, but rather quite proud of it. The revival of Hanfu, keeping the Chinese traditions, customs and holidays are examples. China is also actively promoting its culture(including films) all over the world and the Chinese language and literature is certainly making a huge impact all over. Why do Chinese establishments in USA,Australia,Canada,England or anywhere else maintain the use of Chinese characters? Why are there still Chinatowns? Why do modern Chinese youths learn mandarin? If we "Hate" our culture you wouldn't be seeing any of those now would we?


And Confucian schools are sprouting up like mushrooms in China right now.


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## Johnor (Jan 8, 2008)

02tonyl said:


> And Confucian schools are sprouting up like mushrooms in China right now.


Why cannot then beautiful pictures of traditional chinese houses spout up like Mushrooms in this Forum?


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## BJSH (Apr 18, 2006)

nice thread


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## duskdawn (May 13, 2006)

Johnor said:


> Why cannot then beautiful pictures of traditional chinese houses spout up like Mushrooms in this Forum?


Because it is not a trend in today's China. Not saying we hate the tradition, but the space-consuming old wood houses are not convenient at all.
Only 2 kinds of people live in traditional houses, the super-poors and the super-riches.


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## staff (Oct 23, 2004)

Johnor said:


> Well, since I am interrested in asian architechture and I was interested to see how chinese cities look like, I took a day of and went throug a lot of galleries here. And almost all chinese galleries on this pages shows skylines that could have belonged to almost any american city. Sorry about Las Vegas. I should have said Denver or Atlanta intstead.
> It would be nice then if there could be skylines and photographs of historical houses. Now I get the impression that chinese cities consists of modern and post-modern highrises.


You do realise that this is a forum about skyscrapers? It's not like all pictures of Sweden on these forums depict small red wooden cottages.


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## the spliff fairy (Oct 21, 2002)

China has gone through its endless wars and fires (many detroyed by Western troops too I may add) 
but there is still a legacy of old buildings.

Look again at this pic of Shanghai:










Those older neighbourhoods account for a bigger land area of any American metropolitan 'Old
Towns' - and its not like anybody points the finger at America and says they hate themselves.
The 'Xintiandi' treatment, whence an old area of town is restored and overnight becomes trendy, is 
slated for areas all over Shanghai and increasingly Beijing, thanks to the meteoric success of the Xintiandi district.

Despite all the historical destruction, anachronism and modernisation there are many old parts of town 
left, and much restoration aswell as nimbyism growing (there were no less than 70,000 protests 
and 'riots' last year in China, much of it on land issues). Even in Beijing some 'old' areas are being 
bulldozed to restore the City wall and minor palaces.

For a complete picture you can either visit Nanjing and Chengdu for preserved old style cityscapes, 
for smaller cities Lijiang, the biggest (population 1.1 million), Pingyao, Dali, Kashgar, Chengde, Qufu
are entire urban UNESCO World Heritage Sites, alongside the myriad watertowns such as Wuzhen, 
Tongli, Zhouzhuang and counting. Thousands of county towns and villages are too numerous to be 
listed by UNESCO.

its interesting to note in poorer more rural villages new buildings are still constructed in old style (and 
are spotless). Richer villages are concreted and dirty.

I understand this is a skyscraper and development site and will only choose its subjects editorially, 
trust me there is ALOT of old in China still - damn shame it couldnt be more, but that doesnt mean theres nothing.

Its interesting to note too, alot of old style buildings are going up as new projects, from rebuilt palaces
to govt buildings to theme parks.


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## Mercutio (Oct 15, 2004)

Well, 'spliff fairy' just gave a great explanation. 

I will just add to that...There are plenty of 'mid-sized' cities in China (ranging from a few hundred thousand to one million inhabitants) which have well preserved old towns. There are numerous large cities (a few million inhabitants) such as Suzhou, Hangzhou or Xi’an which have seen large-scale development in recent years while many of the old quarters have been retained. Especially in cities along the coast (many of these cities have actually little history) such as Shanghai, Tianjin, Guangzhou, Harbin, Qingdao or Xiamen many colonial era buildings can be found. 


*Lijiang*




















*Dali*











*Shangri-La*











*Pingyao*











*Fenghuang*





























*Hangzhou*











*Kashgar*




















*Suzhou*











*Xi’an*




















*Harbin*


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## mbuildings (May 6, 2007)

stunning city


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## the spliff fairy (Oct 21, 2002)

rebuilt palaces - 

Han dynasty Wu palace, Wuxi










Qin dynasty, E Pang palace, Xian - other successive palaces in the area over the millennia were 3.5, 4, 5 and 7x bigger too than the Forbidden City the worlds largest) but havent, or are waiting to be, rebuilt:




















Tang Dynasty Daming palace, the biggest of the lot covering 3.5 sq km and currently being restored:

















some of the halls:



























restoration of the worlds tallest building at the time, and currently the worlds tallest pagoda (destroyed 6x in its 1300 year history), the 520 ft high Tianning temple pagoda, Changzhou










Huaqing palace, near Xian


















the new Nanshan temple, (complete with a 330ft Guanyin statue, taller than Lady Liberty), Hainan





























The biggest billion dollar project, they are currently building a replica of the fabled Yuanmingyuan, though controversially near Hangzhou. The Old Summer Palace was destroyed by colonial troops in 1860, the worlds largest gardens and one of the biggest palace complexes ever built.
It consisted of dozens of lakes, each with an island, and a pavilion or palace on it:




























There are currently hundreds of monasteries and temples being restored in Tibet too (of the 300 before) that were disbanded or wrecked by the regime during the Cultural Revolution.

Shechen monastery

















Dzongsar and Kunbum
















Wudangzhao monastery









Likewise Chinese temples lost in that period are getting the same treatment. *Currently $41.3 billion is being spent restoring over 100 historic sites in and around Beijing*

Yongdingmen Gate (1553) restoration along with a 1.8 km section of the City Walls, once the worlds largest, Beijing









note the building in the background...


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## Johnor (Jan 8, 2008)

@Mercutio 

Thank you very much.
Beautiful! Just amazing pictures.
Lijiang looks brilliant.


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## Johnor (Jan 8, 2008)

@The Spliff Fairy
Interesting projects!
Should look into it.


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## Johnor (Jan 8, 2008)

staff said:


> You do realise that this is a forum about skyscrapers? It's not like all pictures of Sweden on these forums depict small red wooden cottages.


And I thougt that most of the swedish old wooden houses were rased in 70s by Socialdemokraterna. Thats why most of the swedish smaller town is full of concrete.
Eller pa svenska: vart berömda och vackra miljonprogramm. Kolla bara pa Malmö där halva gamla stan revs.


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## koolkid (Apr 17, 2006)

the spliff fairy said:


> Those older neighbourhoods account for a bigger land area of any American metropolitan 'Old
> Towns' - and its not like anybody points the finger at America and says they hate themselves.


Huh? We don't really have specific "old towns" here in the US(there are few exceptions like New Orleans). Historic buildings can be found literally all over and still make up the majority of the buildings in many american cities. From brownstones to row houses or tenements, you name it...

Shanghai has some awesome skyscrapers and looks amazing from atop but I don't like the fact that there are too many cloned blocks all over the place. Enough with the white bland concrete, I say...


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## the spliff fairy (Oct 21, 2002)

Alot of US cities are naming a few old blocks 'old towns' now or 'heritage districts', eg the Gaslamp Quarter in San Diego being a good example. The thing is there are vast tracts of old housing still in Chinas cities, much larger and older than the scattered remnants in US centres, but everyone decrying how China has sold its soul. True decry how the old buildings were torn down, but dont say theres nothing left, or that theyre doing it to ape the West.

Anyways, alot of the Shanghai concrete is unavoidable - housing up to 21,000 newcomers a day (as in 2003 when the migration laws were relaxed) is quite a feat. China's currently going through the biggest migration of humans in history, with over 300 million rural people coming into the urban centres. If all the current new development had been built with traditional materials the country would have run out of sand, wood, and stone supplies long ago to make the bricks. Thats why so many single storey neighbourhoods (without heating or toilets, and an average of 2 sq m living space I may add) have been torn down and replaced by dense highrises with all mod cons and much more living space.

I totally agree though its a shame, I would love to have seen Beijings hutongs and Shanghais Shiheyuan cityscapes survive much more too, but its a near impossibility. Beijings population has climbed from 9 million to 16 million in less than a decade, Shanghai's from 13 million to over 20 million.

To cut the story short, its a crime the old buildings are torn down but at the same time you can see why that crime was and is being committed.


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## Johnor (Jan 8, 2008)

the spliff fairy said:


> To cut the story short, its a crime the old buildings are torn down but at the same time you can see why that crime was and is being committed.


But I cannot see why you cannot have both. It is first the latest years that Beijing have started to seriosly to conserve its old town. Many of the houses that replaced the Hutongs were acutally bizniztowers that could have been put anywhere else in city. 

US has traditionally had a bad heritage politics compared to Europe. I can agree on that. Heritages Zones is a new trend in US: compared to Quebeck City or Montreal Old Town. Destruction of large parts of Savannah is a typical example.

Take Paris for example: it grows very fast, but the down town remains the same. The city centre is the place where the culture is. I have been doing some reserach about the topic the last days and both Beijing, Shanghai, Suzhou, and Xian is tightning upp its protection of ancient houses. 

Well, I think that China should be conscious about that Chinese traditinal culture and architechture belongs to the peaks of human achievements. 
I guess it would be the same to tear down half of Venice or Vienna and replace it with skyscrapers.


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