Thursday, June 17, 2010

Shanghai. The Pop-up City.

Did you visit Shanghai in 20 or more years ago? If so, the city is not how you would remember it. The images below are taken from the same view looking towards the city centre, 20 years apart (1990 - 2010). Its hard to believe its the same city!

The entire city essentially popped up in just 2 decades - you can see that basically no exisitng fabric was maintained; the buildings in the foreground are all different as well as the overhaul of green space in the centre of the top image.



Questions which come to mind... Could Brisbane look like this in 20 years time? Why doesn't it look like that now? Is our current city plan (and associated documentation) facilitating what we envisage Brisbane to become? Do we want our city to look like Shanghai or would we want to retain Brisbane's current physical / cultural condition? Would the generational change in 20 years allow for different design outcomes to be achieved or desired? Are we trying to protect something we don't really need to protect?

1 comment:

  1. I don't think we really know what we want. Everyone seems to be anti density and percieve that we are over populated. These beliefs are all unfounded by fact. Until we are mature enough to acknowledge that the great Australian Dream is divisive to sustainable growth we will not achieve sustainable development.

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