III. ENVIRONMENT MONITORING AND URBAN PLANNING

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D. Land use in Shanghai

[ D | D-1 | D-2 | D-3 | D-4 ]

1. Status of land use in the whole city

1. Among the various land use types, the area of agriculture and water forms the main with 72.38 per cent.- 
2. Residential area ranks second with 14.65 per cent. Urban residential area holds 3.45 per cent while rural residential area accounts for 11.19 per cent. Following these are industrial land and transportation land, with 5.24 per cent and 4.25 per cent respectively. Other types of land use hold very low percentages. 
3. The percentage of green area is only 0.24 per cent, and the green area per capita is 1.17 sq m. These figures are a long way from being comparable to those of many large cities in the world. 

Figure 36. The land use structure in the whole city

4. Land use is spatially ring structured. The core is the urban area, undergoing intensive urbanization. The first circle outside is the vegetable belt in the near suburbs. This green belt entirely encompasses the urban area. The second circle is a ring of bases for sideline food and crops, and a number of livestock farms are also run here. The third one is at the far suburbs, a ring of fresh water fishery, bases for fruits and crops, where intensively cultivated fish ponds and orchards hold a substantial percentage. Fish ponds mainly gather to the west of Qingpu and Songjiang County, and the south of Jinshan, Fengxian and Nanhui County. Many large orchards are distributed in Nanhui, Fengxian and the Changxing Island. Fruit planting in Jiading and Qingpu has also developed rapidly in recent years. Seasonal fruits and melon are planted in Jinshan, Fengxian and Nanhui, and this belt, rich in aquatic products and fruits, provides an important service to the central city.

Figure 37. The land use structure in the central city 

5. Three classes of land use structure are observed. The first is in the central city including ten districts (figure 37) which accounts for 4.42 per cent of the total area of Shanghai. The land use structure has strong characteristics of a large city.

Figure 38. The land use structure in the four suburban districts

The second class can be identified in the near suburban districts of Jiading, Jinshan, Minghang and Pudong New Area, where the total land area is 1,776.93 sq km. The land use structure in this part is shown by figure 38. Originally the suburban area, these districts are now the urban fringe where 64 per cent of ongoing construction land is densely distributed. However, the rural land use structure is still clear - all types of urban land use account for only one third of the total, agricultural land and water occupying the remaining two thirds. In general, the urbanization process is accelerating in this region.

The third class, typical rural structure, remains in the far suburbs which is composed of six counties (figure 39). Urban land use types cover less than one fourth of the total area in this part. Agricultural land and water occupy 78.7 per cent.

Figure 39. The land use structure in the six suburban counties

The land use structure of Shanghai clearly shows that its urban development has been strongly shaped by the accumulative process, thus forming the overall spatial structure - a large city with small suburbs. Thus situation, accommodating such a large population and with a huge economic infrastructure, is obviously unfavourable for Shanghai in transforming itself into an international metropolis. By comparison, many world famous metropolises have passed the accumulative urbanization process, are experiencing suburbanization or counter-urbanization, therefore forming megalopolises with explicit functions and close interrelationships between the grouping cities. A large city with large suburbs should be the ideal pattern of urbanization for Shanghai. During the First Five-Year Plan period, specialized industrial zones were established in the near suburbs. In the Second Plan period, industrialized satellite towns were set up in the far suburbs, such as Wusong, Minhang, Wujing, An'ting, Jiading and Songjiang. During the 1970s, large-scale satellite towns - Jinshan and Baoshan for petrochemical and steel industries - were developed. All these efforts had to a certain extent helped to disperse the population and industry crowded in the central city, and demonstrated a correct understanding of the ideal spatial pattern of urban development. However, due to relatively low social productivity and insufficient economic strength, infrastructure and public facilities in these satellite towns did not catch up with the shifts in industry and population. Moreover, communications between the central city and the satellite towns were choked, thus hindering the further development of the latter. The growth of a sound town system therefore withered.

The new mode for development adopted by Pudong New Area - clustered, multi-cored and open patterned, embodies the general law in the growth of a metropolis. Those clusters and cores are becoming the growth poles along the urban-rural fringe, promoting the progress of suburbanization. However, priority in intensively improving urban infrastructure must be taken into account, because the current volumes of public facilities, municipal utilities and green area together cover only 1 per cent of the total area of the four suburb districts and six suburb counties. This is still far from meeting the needs of the constant advance of urbanization in this area.

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