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Beijing Municipal Commission of Urban Planning released more details about the planning of constructing Tongzhou into a “subsidiary administrative center” on Tuesday, three days after an official acknowledgement of the plan.
The municipal planning body revealed that municipal administrative institutions will gradually transfer to Tongzhou, a suburban district to the southeast. The move is expected to drive the population flow from downtown Beijing to the “subsidiary administrative center”.
It also announced that transportation between downtown areas and Tongzhou will be more expedite through interurban rails.
Beijing, a megacity with a population of more than 20 million, has been plagued with increasingly severe urban woes such as traffic congestion, air pollution, and sky-rocketing housing prices and living costs.
Although the capital city tries to contain the population expansion with its controversial house-hold registration system, or “Hukou”, which denies people without Beijing“Hukou” equal access to schools, hospitals and even buying houses and cars in the city, people around the country continue to flock in, attracted by its many opportunities and the thousand-year-old capital’s charisma.
To divert the population flow has become an emergency for Beijing government, that's where the construction of a “subsidiary administrative center” in suburban Tongzhou comes in.
Huang Yan, director of Beijing Municipal Commission of Urban Planning, noted that the transfer of administrative institutions will hopefully bring along many other institutions and firms of scientific research, business, culture, exhibition and convention, and etc.
“Looking back at the development of cosmopolis such as Paris, Seoul and Tokyo, a subsidiary administrative center has always been the effective prescription to cure urban illnesses,” Huang said.
“The planning idea of Tongzhou new town is optimizing and upgrading,” Huang Yan said, “It’s not just city expansion.”
According to the 2015 Key Project Task List released by Tongzhou District Government in March, the district has 86 key construction projects with an investment of 163.88 billion yuan this year.
Tongzhou will give more weight to high-end manufacturing and services. Low-end whole-sale markets and logistics bases will be relocated outside.
It's also trying to catch up with downtown Beijing in public services.
“Tongzhou still lags behind in terms of public infrastructure construction, far from the standard for a municipal administrative center,” said Wang Fei, vice director of Beijing Municipal Commission of Urban Planning.
Wang told that some schools and hospitals had already established branches in Tongzhou. The district will introduce more quality education and healthcare resources, Wang added.
Tongzhou as a second administrative center of Beijing city will also be a key pivot of implementing the strategy of integrating the development of Beijing, Tianjin and Hebei.
“Undoubtedly, the subsidiary administrative center of Beijing will certainly become a highland in the region, pushing forward the development of surrounding districts and counties, which in turn brings huge pressure for Tongzhou,” said an official of Tongzhou government.
Zhao Hong, vice director of Beijing Academy of Social Sciences, echoed the concerns, “the construction of a subsidiary administrative center is for relieving urban illnesses, however, blind development will incur new problems.”
“A planning map should be in place for Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei coordinated development, especially for the border areas,” said Huang Yan.
