Megacities of Asia Part II: Perils of the concrete jungle
Unprecedented levels of migration from rural areas have led to a host of logistical and environmental problems, writes Vanessa Collingridge.
One hour’s drive from Hong Kong takes you to a construction field of reddish brown mud. Here, amid the snaking tracks of dump trucks, men in hard hats discuss the transformation of 15 sq km of wasteland into what’s fast becoming known as the “Manhattan of the Pearl River Delta”.
Qianhai – or, to give it its formal title, the “Qianhai Shenzhen-Hong Kong Modern Service Industry Cooperation Zone” – is the very model of a modern urban centre.
On paper, it looks like something out of Star Wars: an arc of skyscrapers rising from reclaimed coastal lands and standing sentinel round a circular harbour. Wide boulevards and geometric patterns proclaim a sense of order and good governance: a safe place for the world’s capital.
For this has been designated a special economic zone, the site of Shenzhen’s new international finance district by 2020 and a nascent competitor to the global greats of Hong Kong’s Central, Wall Street and the City of London.
“It’s a hot topic of debate whether Qianhai will be in competition with Hong Kong,” says Marcos Chan, head of research for Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan for real-estate multinational CBRE. “Here we have a big piece of land in Shenzhen with potentially up to some 150 million square feet of office space that effectively transforms it into a new strategic centre for commerce, finance and the professional services. And there are enormous incentives for companies to set up business here.
It’s leveraging on the fact that while it might be physically in mainland China, for the first time ever there’s a chance that Hong Kong’s legal framework can be applied in certain business aspects.”
In the past 12 months, more than 10 sites have been sold and their developers have broken ground.