Reshaping Memory Lane The case of Zhongshan Avenue Frank D’hondt & Jaap Modder
This article is a shortened version of the original Review Report, which features in ISOCARP’s Review 13 publication, page 252 - 274, launched and presented at ISOCARP 54th World Congress in Portland, USA and available online at www.isocarp.org.
Wuhan is located at the confluence of the Yangtze and Hanshui Rivers and is comprised of the three towns of Wuchang, Hankou, and Hanyang (Figure 1). Wuhan aspires to be an urban innovation in China, ahead of, and in line with, the new national urban policy for China , aiming at a more compact, better integrated, more socially inclusive, better connected, and climate resilient Chinese cities. However, it remains a huge challenge to keep up with the fast pace of urbanisation while keeping and/ or making the old and new cities liveable, breathable, and thus less car-dependent . While Riverfront high-rise construction is still the most visible staple of urban expansion and densification, Wuhan is also investing heavily in the regeneration of the existing urban fabric and historic areas of the city including the Tanhualin District in Wuchang, and the Zhongshan Avenue District in Hankou. Both cases exemplify the policy intention to reconnect with the past and ensure Wuhan’s rich cultural and architectural heritage is preserved for generations to come. In 2013, Wuhan Municipal Government’s planned to close Zhongshan Avenue to facilitate the construction of a new metro. This action provided a unique opportunity for the Wuhan Land Use and Urban Spatial Planning Research Centre (WLSP) to initiate the 'Zhongshan Avenue District Renewal Plan'.
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Figure 1 : Location in Wuhan A Long Street with a Great Story Towards the end of the Qing Dynasty, Hankou was one of the Yangtze River cities that was opened to foreign trade by the 1858 Treaty of Tienstin. From 1861 to 1898, the UK, Germany, Russia, France, and Japan established their own concessions in Hankou. Once all five concessions were established, ports and freight yard warehouses were opened along the river, large public-service buildings were constructed on the main avenue, and embassies, banks, churches, hospitals, schools, hotels, and other public service buildings, as well as mansions, villas, flats were built on the business street located on the western side of the concession - now Zhongshan Avenue . As a result,
exquisite European buildings featuring great architecture such as Hankou’s red-brick water tower – Wuhan’s tallest building until 1924 – still stands as one of the most famous landmarks. The intermingling of foreign people, SinoWestern streets, and exotic lifestyles can still be seen in the buildings of Hankou to remind people of this dazzling era. With the consecutive ending of the concessions between 1917 and 1945, Zhongshan Avenue was only gradually integrated into the post-revolution urban fabric and transformed into the commercial axis to/from the new developing CBD in West-Hankou, including low-rise housing occupied by impoverished early rural-urban migrants like the Li-Feng community with their typical Linung housing style behind the commercial and historic facades of the avenue.