Urban planning in Shangai refers to various phases of planning and development of the city of Shangai, China.
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Shangai was traditionally a fishing and textiles town, and until the 1840s, despite the commercial importance as a major port, was considered a Prefecture-level city, which is the lowest in China’s traditional hierarchy of urban places.
After the First Opium War (1839-1842), as a result of 1842 Treaty of Nanking, Shanghai opened as a treaty port in 1843. The British, Americans, followed by the French, built their own concessions, mainly along the Suzhou Creek. During this period, western planning concepts were introduced.
As a traditional Chinese city, by the mid-sixteenth century, Shanghai had gained its massive walls, designed both to enclose the town and, formed as an oval ring around the dense buildings of the city, to divert the canals to form a moat.[Notes 1] Prior to foreign settlements, initiated in 1840s, the city’s main streets had hardly changed.
Consul Balfour administrated the laying out of the settlement’s master plan, which including an area, mainly along the west bank of the Yangtze, between the Yangtze Creek at the southern end and close to the Suzhou Creek at the northern end. [Notes 2] The overall plan mirrors the that of 19 century London; including paved streets, a tram system, a pure and continuous water supply, and adequate sewage disposal. In a short time, the nucleus of Shanghai became a relatively modern, open urban structure, contrasting with the dense development of the Chinese city, and was considered by foreigners as a “Model Settlement”. [Notes 3]
In 1929, following the establishment of the city government of Greater Shanghai, a city Planning Commission was founded, composed of people from various backgrounds, including both Chinese experts and foreign consultants. A planning scheme called The Greater Shanghai Plan was soon published, which included for the redevelopment of the older district and proposed a new city centre located in the Jiangwan district, between the site of a proposed new port and the foreign settlement. Rail and future extensions of existing port facilities were considered in relation to the new site, as well as a proposed system of broad, rectilinear streets designed to alleviate Shanghai’s growing congestion problems. The plan designated around 15% of the area to parks and open spaces, with the most ambitious element being a civic centre, occupying 333 acres, to include a 50m high pagoda and a Washington style reflecting pool.[Notes 4]
Due to civil unrest, most of the plan remained unbuilt and that which was constructed was almost entirely demolished during the Sino-Japanese War (1937-1945).
In 1946, the Shanghai city planning board was established, in order to draft a Master Plan for Shanghai. Similar to post-war regional planning elsewhere, the Shanghai master plan placed a great deal of emphasis on its relationship with broader regional planning. For the first time, it was understood that a balanced development of hitherto underdeveloped areas on the other side of the river would benefit the city plan. This could be accomplished by bridging the river and by construction of a cross-river tunnel.[Notes 5] However, due to the failure of the Nationalist Government to cope with China’s endemic problems, as well as the extraordinary burdens of post-war construction, the Plan was never totally implemented, and was finally abandoned after the retreat of the Kuomingtang to Taiwan and the establishment of the People's Republic of China.
Between 1949 and 1956, under the umbrella of socialist construction, planning in Shangai was limited to the restoration of all utilities, communication and transportation lines and other basic infrastructure improvements. From 1956, a massive urban renewal project was proposed for the Zhabei district in Shanghai, as well as the planned relocation of population and industry through the establishment of seven satellite towns around Shanghai.[Notes 6]
The following two decades were dominated by deconstruction, as a direct result of a sequence of political movements, including the Great Leap Forward in 1958 and the Cultural Revolution from 1966 to 1976. It was not until the fall of the Gang of Four, and the adoption of China’s open policy in the late 1970s, that the deconstruction in Shanghai finally came to an end.