Shanghai makes plans to become a better city

The Jakarta Post ,  Jakarta   |  Tue, 05/29/2007 8:39 AM  |  Opinion

Zhou Muyao, Jakarta

In the early 1990s, Shanghai set forth a strategic goal of becoming a modern world city, with urban development and management as its strategic focus. Thanks to rapid development during the 1990s, the pressure on three chronic problems, namely, traffic, housing and environment, has been substantially alleviated and urban management and public services significantly enhanced.

In the new century, especially after we implemented the Eleventh Five-Year Plan of National Economy and Social Development, by capitalizing on the opportunity to host the 2010 World Expo, Shanghai has stepped up its efforts to strengthen public administration, services and security. We hope to better demonstrate the Expo theme, ""Better City, Better Life"", fully embracing the scientific concept of development and aiming at building a harmonious socialist society.

Shanghai has accumulated some experience in the following areas: public transportation, energy conservation and environmental protection, and grid management.

A key component of Shanghai's urban management is prioritizing public transportation in order to better serve the citizens. Because this is an important issue, many measures have been put in place to better control traffic flow and ward off the risk of large-scale, lasting congestion.

We feel strongly that due to structural problems, nothing but optimizing traffic structure and increasing the appeal of mass transit will be effective in dealing with the root causes of the problem. To this end, Shanghai has focused on the following two measures.

First, we have made rail transportation the key to an optimized transportation structure and accelerated the development of the rail network. Our long-term vision is to create a network with 17 lines and a total length of 780 kilometers. Since 2001, rail ridership has been growing by an average of 16 percent per year.

A preliminary network has taken shape, one that has 6 lines, including the magnetic levitation line. There are 172 km open to traffic, over 600 million users every year and a daily peak patronage of over 2.4 million. By 2010, Shanghai will see a basic rail transport network in place with 11 lines and more than 400 km open to traffic, which will account for 35 percent of the passenger load of mass transit.

Second, we have embraced a strategy of prioritizing mass transit and boosting the appeal of public transportation.

As part of this effort, we have first placed great emphasis on building urban transportation hubs where there used to be relatively weak links. By 2010, 60 hubs within central city districts will be built to link key rail projects so that interchanges can happen more smoothly.

Second, we will add more bus lanes. We plan to have 300 km of bus lanes covering the major roads in the central districts. More than 70 km has been completed, with very good results.

Third, we offer discounted fares to those who interchange via the public transport system. By the end of this year, this initiative will benefit a growing population of rail and non-rail users in the central districts.

Fourth, we have expanded the use of information technology in managing urban transport by introducing a data collection and distribution system and using diverse methods to inform the public.

In order to achieve scientific and harmonious development, a natural choice for Shanghai is to place a premium on energy conservation and environmental protection and to build a conservation-oriented eco-friendly city.

Shanghai has a very large population, but its land size is limited. Given the constraints on resources and environment, the only solution is to develop a circular economy and recycle resources for higher efficiency. In this way, resources will no longer be a bottleneck for development, pollution will be eliminated and a scientific and harmonious development path will unfold.

Since 2000 when the first Three Year Plan of Action for Environmental Protection was launched, we have finished two rounds and are now implementing the third, which deals more with root causes and strives for a balance between the urban and rural areas. The overall goal is to pay back the debt owed to the environment and make an all-out effort to build an eco-friendly city.

The main components of the plan include water protection, air quality control, reuse of after-treatment solid waste and treatment of industrial and agricultural pollution. We strictly abide by the following two principles when acting on the plan.

One, it must benefit the urban layout and industrial restructuring.

Two, it must help improve urban management and the living standards of the citizens. To this end, we have set hard targets for urban sewage treatment, public green areas, air quality, hazard-free treatment of domestic waste and energy consumption.

It is our hope that by acting on this important initiative of building a conservation-oriented and eco-friendly city, we can not only improve the citizens' livelihood and the environment, but also help to transform the economic growth model, thereby contributing to sound and rapid socioeconomic development.

An important means of strengthening Shanghai's urban management is grid management to achieve the secure and orderly operation of the city. As part of the effort to find innovative approaches to urban management, Shanghai rolled out grid management starting in 2005.

Within every community grid, all kinds of issues and problems can be identified and addressed in a timely manner by using information technology and integrating the use of resources for urban management. The city is divided into grids, and managed in such a way as to provide full coverage. We focus on three things.

First, we are trying to improve the look of the city. In view of the coming World Expo and our goal of constantly upgrading public services, we have made serious efforts to address the recurring problems of the city while giving full consideration to our people's livelihood, in areas such as food markets, traffic concentration and distribution centers.

Second, we have improved the city's emergency response system. Shanghai's preparedness is a major issue given the density of population, buildings, cables and pipelines in central districts. After several years of work, we have established a fairly sophisticated work system to handle emergencies and put in place a unified, shared and coordinated emergency response command center with competent subsystems to deal with specific problems. In handling public emergencies, we need to learn from cities with rich experience while coming up with our own innovations.

Third, we pay great attention to the hidden risks of the city, such as land subsidence, outdoor air-conditioning units, glass exteriors of buildings, and underground cables and pipelines. At the same time, we continue to improve the city's security infrastructure, optimize the civil defense and fire layout, and enhance the earthquake, meteorological and environmental monitoring network.

Shanghai is striving to become an international economic, financial, trade and shipping center. We sincerely hope that by sharing information we can learn and draw upon the advanced philosophy and experience of other cities and strengthen our communication and cooperation, thereby contributing to the common development and prosperity of all.

The writer is Vice Chairman of the Standing Committee of the Shanghai Municipal People's Congress.

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