Special Area Planning

I was impressed with the special zone planning in Guangzhou City after a briefing done by the city planners last week. The demarcation of an area for speciality and land use or activities with its own uniqueness and characteristics is not something new, the successful exercution however is something new and difficult.

Most of the time, city planners would like to see their plan comes to reality. However, the implementation stage which come much later is normally failing the plan. It can be the problem of securing financing, disagreement of the market forces, readiness of the stakeholders, capacity of the city managers and etc. Even though implementation is carried out as planned, it might be turned out to be different thing or not according to the plan. For example, although business park is envisioned for Section 13, the development itself without proper coordination might realise the place as another conventional type of commercial centre without its unique features, such as the green business hub with amble accessibility and connectivity.

Guangzhou City manages to differentiate area with its own features. When you are in ThianHe area, it is cosmopolitan like commercial centre and likewise in Baizhou, it is M.I.C.E convention centre. The YueSiao area is the older part of the City with many greenery and historical building and places of interest. Similarly, along the Pearl River is the leisure centre.

For Petaling Jaya, I believe similar exercise has to be carried out. Perhaps starting with the place making exercise should be held. Place making means developing an area with its soul and characteristics. For example, Old Town can be the wholesale centre for PJ. And to encourage related activities there, incentive scheme shall be offered and development should be facilitated. In this respect, Local Authority should play a bigger role for promoting and guiding the development at the level of daily routine. The time of approving and licensing the development projects only without nurturing the growth of an area with its special features is gone, to me.