China to reach 50% urban population by 2015

Recently Li Shouxin, director of the Development Planning Department stated that China’s urban population had reached 622 million by the end of 2009, with the urbanization rate standing at nearly 47 percent with the urban population growing by just under 1% annually over the last five years.

Zhang Qin, deputy director of the Urban-Rural Planning Department under the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development (MOHURD), said the rapid urbanization of China will continue for 15 to 20 years and China will become an urban society during the “12th Five-Year Plan” period (between 2011 and 2015 ).

The process will create a market of at least 1 trillion yuan ($146 billion) in the coming 20 years, according to a report by the Xinhua News Agency.

[SOURCES: People's Daily Online and Global Times]

APA Announces Sustaining Places Initiative at World Urban Forum

American Planning Association (APA) President Bruce Knight, FAICP, at the United Nation’s Fifth World Urban Forum (WUF) in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil announced the Sustaining Places Initiative will focus on the role of planning in addressing the entire set of human settlement issues relating to sustainability.

The initiative will establish a Sustaining Places Task Force that will focus on the use of the comprehensive plan as the leading policy document and tool to help communities of all sizes achieve sustainability. Work of the task force will include a survey of existing best practices, evolving needs and practices and the ways in which practices should change in the future in order for the comprehensive plan to better achieve its role as the leading policy document.

A Sustaining Places Day will be held during APA’s Federal Policy and Program Briefing in September 2010 that will include collaboration with the American Institute of Architects Challenge 2030 and the American Society of Landscape Architects Sustainable Sites.

[SOURCE: APA]

Extreme Urban Makeover: Detroit

DAVID WHITFORD at TIME magazine reports on the appointment of star urban planner named Toni Griffin who is soon set to start her new assignment of Detroit’s downsizing and urban makeover. However, I don’t think this will be a one week project filmed for a one hour special on TLC or HGTV.

According to the article Toni Griffin who is Adjunct Associate Professor of Urban Planning at the Harvard GSD Department of Urban Planning and Design will be working within the city planning department but her role and other consultants will be funded by the Kresge Foundation.

The project will draw worldwide attention as many cities in the USA and Europe are going through the same process of planning the renewal and revitalisation of former industrial power house cities that have reduced in population but not size.

Read the TIME article at the [SOURCE: TIME - Downsizing Detroit]

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Detroit taps planner for downsizing effort – Detroit News

Abu Dhabi releases Urban Street Design Manual

The Abu Dhabi Urban Planning Council (UPC) recently released a new street design standards in line with the Capital 2030 plan. The Urban Street Design Manual is based on key design principles including environmental sustainability embodied by the Estidama initiative. The Design Manual incorporates multi-modal forms of transport and varying land uses.

With the introduction of the Urban Street Design Manual, the UPC aims to reduce the emirate’s reliance on personal motorised vehicles by implementing a network of public transit to include highspeed rail and rapid transit options such as trams and buses.

The innovative street designs will provide genuine choice of movement by walking, cycling and public transport modes as well as in private motor vehicles. Abu Dhabi residents and visitors will start witnessing the transformation as early as 2010 when a City Centre street will be reconstructed according to the design standards.

The Urban Street Design Manual will be showcased at Cityscape Abu Dhabi 2010 to be held from April 18 to 21.

Read more at the [SOURCE: AMEINFO.com]

SWA urban design project in Anning, China starts construction

The principal government of Miyi County in Sichuan Province, China, just north of Kunming, has started construction on the first phase of a 330-hectare (1.3 square miles) new-town designed by SWA Group’s Los Angeles office utilizing historical ecologies as well as technology innovation to create a more sustainable community.

One of the largest of many city design competitions won by SWA, the Anning River new-town will include higher-density housing and commercial areas as well as preserved agricultural practices, parks and recreation zones. When complete, the new South Miyi County, also known as New South Town, would be home to up to 100,000 people via new construction of 2.3 million square meters of building area and 20,000 units of housing. North Miyi is already home to 500,000 people.

[SOURCE: Businesswire - SWA Group Wins Design for Anning River New Town for 100,000 People Starting Construction Near Kunming, China]

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