SHANGHAI CASE-STUDY

Growing cities all over the world have been experiencing an increase of a vernacular architecture within the growing slums. In China and especially Shanghai, slums have become a typical sight paralleled between the huge skyscrapers and other transnational urbanist architecture. Shanghai has always been a city of growth, diversity and cosmopolitan life. Shanghai's location as a port is perfect for trade as it sits along the coast of the Pacific Ocean and has the Huangpu River, an inlet of the Yangtze River, which provides access deeper into the city (Shanghai, 2009). After the Treaty of Nanking opened five of China's ports to the world, Shanghai's port became a major location for the entrance and exit of goods and people. Many factors led to the urbanization of the city after it became an open port. The once farm and fishery town began changing into an industrial city created by the import and export of goods. The British, French and Americans began building concessions in Shanghai shortly after the treaty to take advantage of trade into Asia and other capitalist ventures. Refugees of war from other countries and refugees of persecution from China's countryside began moving to Shanghai for safety and work. Business began booming and started Shanghai down the capitalistic path we still see today. All these factors helped create Shanghai into a megacity by the 1900's. By the 1920's and 1930's, Shanghai's version of Beijing's hutong housing, began booming. Lilongs, also called longtangs, are two or three story housing developments that took up block after block in attempt for the international concessions to make money. When the concessions began allowing immigrants to work and live within their safe walls they had to use land efficiently to make some money. Soon lilong's efficiency caused for lilongs to be built everywhere to accommodate the massive populations coming to Shanghai during that time. Lilongs have become Shanghai's vernacular architecture that created a close, vernacular culture among those living in the housing settlements. Over the years overcrowding, overpopulation, poor maintenance, and poor sanitation from lack of bathrooms or worse have created problems with lilong blocks which are today considered slum settlements. Despite poor living conditions in lilongs, for the middle to lower classes this is all they can afford. Today in the ever growing metropolis many tattered lilongs still remain while others have been torn down to make way for new high rise apartments, evil paradises and commercial skyscrapers. Throughout the last century, Shanghai continued to grow and so did the portion of its population in poverty. The fast growing city and change in urbanization barriers in the 1980's created a "peasant flood" of unauthorized migrants from other parts of China, creating more poor inhabitants. Also in the 1980's, Shanghai was decided to become the global city in China by capitalistic politicians.

A tent city just waiting to be plowed over when the next development starts (Flicker).

Globalization of the city caused fast-paced building of skyscraper after skyscraper that displaced masses of poor people living in lilongs. In 2003, China had 193.3 million people living in slums which equal 37.8 percent of the total population (Davis, 2006, p. 24). According to research in Mike Davis's book Planet of the Slums, China has the largest slum population in the world; though not the biggest percentage. Shanghai, which is China's largest city with a population of over 20 million, has somewhere between six to eight million people living within its urban slums (Davis, 2006, p. 23). Displacement of the poor has created shantytowns built in alleyways and even more overcrowding of remaining lilongs. In the Urban Development Center, a huge planned model of what Shanghai will look like by 2020 generates excitement for capitalists and despair for lower class residents. Many residents go to look for their homes or communities on the planned model and realize that their lived space is not there (Miller, 2007). In fact most colonial and vernacular architecture that house the slum dwellers and others in poverty are planned to be torn down. Already the taste of capitalism has encouraged the government to declare many of the shanty towns and older lilongs as unsafe due to fire danger as the slums property value increases. Though the dangers of slum areas are true, the government is less concerned about safety and more concerned about using the slum space for buildings that will bring in capital. Displacement of people in Shanghai is a vicious circle that will continue to be the primary problem that faces the middle to lower classes in Shanghai. First, older buildings and housing that line the blocks are getting torn down, and then the shantytowns and slums that people are displaced into are also torn down, all to make way for new, bigger and better building of urban amenities (Cervero). With the 2010 World Expo coming to Shanghai, there has been an attempt to clean up some issues that face Shanghai. Similar attempts occurred in Beijing when getting ready for the 2008 Olympics that are happening as Shanghai gets ready for the World Expo (Davis 106). Shanghai leaders want to build a new venue for the World Expo as well as accompanying buildings around it to accommodate the visitors and encourage them to spend as much money as possible. Building this new venue is a perfect example of the residential displacement, or resettlement as the government calls it, which is happening all the time, overcrowding Shanghai's remaining slums.

Maybe the reformation of Shanghai will be good for the city and the slums. The planned model of Shanghai shows many high rise apartment buildings that cover the city in between the skyscrapers twice their size. Unfortunately, the building of urban core multifamily housing, apartments and condos are often too pricey for the lower classes, the displaced people, and the incoming migrants from China's country sides. The National University of Singapore's Department of Architecture/School of Design and Environment did a study of Shanghai and came up with eight imaginative housing developments that if properly integrated throughout the city could actually make life better for those in poverty while adhering to the government's ideal image of Shanghai 2020. The researchers understood the importance lilong housing has on the community and wanted to expand the architecture to intertwine the new and the old. The eight different models created the same efficiency, alleyways, shared kitchens and atriums of the old style lilongs but expanded them vertically. Therefore allowing the structures to remain cheap to build, affordable for lower classes and keep some of the nostalgia of old Shanghai as everything else changes. (Limin, 2007) Finally many factors assisted in creating Shanghai's focus on capitalism and neglect for humanitarianism. Everything from the smallest events to large evolutional change made the city what it is today. Factors from the geography of the city, to the many different political leaders and happenings, to immigration and globalization, to international concessions and international culture have all together created the megacity filled with people and many problems. For the lower class living in slums the factors above led to them having to live in small, overcrowded, unsanitary, unhealthy living conditions. To make things worse for slum dwellers their homes continue to get torn down and people are displaced into even worse conditions when they cannot afford the replacement living space, all so the city will match this picturesque idea that Shanghai officials plan it to become by 2020. In 2020, will all the current slum dwellers have proper lived areas for them? What is going to happen to them all when the last lilong is torn down? Slums are a transnational trend that is not isolated only to China but are actually common throughout the world. So maybe by looking at other growing megacities, like those on our Course Web Project Homepage, we can find an answer to what will happen in the future.

Ever since the early 90s, downtown area in Shanghai has undergone a major modernization makeup, where old houses are torn down and inhabitants (usually the underprivileged) are relocated to the outskirts of the city, leaving the space for modern condos, luxury hotels, shopping centres.

QUESTIONS: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. Outline the main reasons for the influx of people into Shanghai (4) What different types of housing are evident in the city? (5) What happens to people when the Government decides to tear down areas of slum housing? (4) What changes do you think might happen in the future in Shanghai? (4) Describe the main features of shanty towns (pg470 to help) (5) What is meant by the informal sector? (pg 472) (4)