Design firm's master plan
CK Designworks, an architectural, planning and interior design company based in Melbourne, has achieved success in Nanjing. The company has won a contract for the master plan of a historic zone in Nanjing, following the completion of the master plan for a hi-tech city in the Pukou district this year.
The master plan for the 40-square-kilometre historic zone was awarded to a consortium comprising CK Designworks and ERM, a sustainability and landscape planner based in Melbourne; Nanjing University's faculty of antiquities and heritage; and two Shanghai-based research groups that will undertake economic and demographic research.
Robert Caulfield, team leader of CK Designworks, says it is a great honour to undertake this project. 'Nanjing is China's historic capital containing many monuments and mausoleums to past rulers, emperors and dignitaries, and a large part of the site is a Unesco World Heritage area,' he says.
Caulfield says one of the biggest challenges is how to deal with a flood of tourism without destroying the very things they are coming to see. 'With China modernising rapidly, there is intense interest in China's history and, with the world's fastest growth in car ownership and high-speed rail networks, the Nanjing government is expecting 10 to 15 million tourists a year by 2020.' The central government should take credit for making heritage conservation a priority, he says. 'We enjoy working with the government because it shows a level of forward thinking and commitment which is not seen in many other countries,' Caulfield adds.
CK Designworks has completed the master planning for a new hi-tech city in Pukou. The 20-square-kilometre city will eventually house 200,000 people and provide 1.6 million jobs. The city will include housing for residents, industrial development and commercial sectors.
All the infrastructure including schools, hospitals, retail facilities, sport and entertainment complexes will be linked by an elevated automated rail transport system.
