Jane Lai
AN urban planning and design forum at Pingshan New Zone and Wuzhou Guest House at the weekend attracted a number of professionals from government departments, prominent institutions and organizations from home and abroad.
Shenzhen s Pingshan New Zone, bordering Huizhou City, was established in June 2009 as a step toward implementing a long-term administrative reform plan approved by the State Council the previous month. It is the second of its kind after Guangming New Zone, which was established next to Dongguan in 2007.
The national and international experts discussed plans to build Pingshan into a low-carbon green zone and a popular livable place. Topics involved Pingshan s transport system, Pingshan River, industrial development, urban planning and community support facilities.
The forum, together with a series of roundtable discussions, paid special attention to a low-carbon economy, urban development, green transportation, the use of new energy, resource recycling, as well as the coexistence of industrialization and urbanization, according to Pingshan New Zone Party chief, Yang Xusong.
Pingshan was being transformed into a world-class new-energy and low-carbon base, Yang said. Experts at the forum have extensive experience in urban planning and environmental protection and we can benefit from their experience.
Occupying an area of 168 square meters, Pingshan is an important industrial base for Shenzhen and is home to Shenzhen East Railway Station, which will be completed soon. The new zone government had been replaced with a municipal government office in administrative reform aiming at reducing the levels of government.
In January last year, Pingshan conducted a similar urban planning forum for domestic and international professionals to brainstorm a new zone, including John Thompson, chairman of John Thompson & Partners and former department head of urban design and planning of the Royal Institute of British Architects, and David Greenberg, an expert in ecological architecture and urban design in the United States.
