Smart Cities in China: A Short Visit to YinChuan

The invitation to attend a TM Forum Conference on Smart Cities in Yinchuan in Ningxia Hui Autonomous Region of China was not something I was going to skip. As an enthusiast and evangelist of Smart Cities across the world, I had heard about the $300 Billion that China had already spent on building these cities and putting all the infrastructure and technology. I was also told that these were ghost cities with hardly any people. I had read that the Chinese Government had invested all the money to keep people busy but most houses were empty and infrastructure was already showing signs of delay due to disuse. This was my chance to see this for real. It was also my chance to see a Smart City in action.

Yinchuan was one of these cities, redeveloped some 15-20 years back. With a population between 2 Million, this was one of the remote small cities to be redeveloped. It was the former capital of the Western Xia Empire of the Tanguts. Google maps showed the city below Mongolia – the wild-west frontiers of China – dominated by Muslim and Arab population. It was the beginning of the New Silk Route from China to the Arab world.

Through this BLOG, I will articulate my two days of extreme observation and contemplation about the situation there. I am an eternal optimist so please take my musings as a one sided observation. Yes – there is likely to be a sad, sorry, sordid, solemn side to this story as well. We will keep that for a different time. This is also not an article where I compare China to India. These are totally different places that do not even warrant a comparison – good or bad.

Coming into the City: The Airport

The first thing that catches your attention when you land in Yinchuan is the airport. A fairly modern airport, big enough for a small city, is already under massive expansion. The number of terminals and gates being added will treble its handling capacity. There were hardly any extra people on the ground tarmac – like we always find people hanging around planes like cleaners, baggage handlers, ramp-operators, catering staff etc. Either they were extremely efficient or somehow there were few workers. We were whisked away in a VIP Handling area directly from the airplane so there was an opportunity to see the airport on the tarmac side as well. On the baggage and city side, all parking entry and exits were automated and cars were RFID tagged so flow of traffic was seamless.

Integrating the City: Roads, Public Transport and Parking

The next thing that catches your attention as you ride into town is the size, planning, and cleanliness of the roads in Yinchuan. The highway into town was 6 lane (3 on each side) and perfect greenery on the side and the fir trees in the divider for 20 kms. Cameras, RFID readers on each lane, smooth roads, on-ramps and off ramps clearly marked, and as we reached the new modern city of Yinchuan, we realized quickly that the stories of ghost cities were true to some extent. Tall residential building complexes, office buildings, gigantic buildings that can only be Government offices etc. all built and ready for occupation but had no occupants.

The concept of road planning and future proofing became evident, every minute. All roads were straight and cut each other at right angles; North to South, and East to West. Each major city road was 8 lane in the center, with a green divider and then a side road for two-wheelers and cycles and then a pavement for pedestrians – on each side. We were staying at the International Convention Center Hotel that was in the  new part of Yinchuan. This area was all new construction buildings and with hardly any residents.

Beyond the pavement were lots of trees and extreme greenery. These carefully planted trees, shrubs, out-door sculptures, decorative lamps, lawns, walkways leading to narrow canals, that were not dirty and polluted with urban refuse, created a perfect camouflage to the tall apartment complexes and office complexes behind them or still being constructed. A lot of cohesive thought had gone into this and the execution was meticulous till the last finishing touch. There was no construction debris along any road.

On reaching the old town or the City Center as it was called, I saw the familiar China that I had seen in other small historic towns last year that had not been redeveloped. This part of town had narrower streets but still with a central road for cars and side roads for scooters and cycles. This was where you started seeing modern mixed-land-use concepts of pedestrian only streets like Europe with Shops on the side, road, cars and pedestrians sharing the flat surface without honking and pushing – each one was giving space to the other. This is the part of town that reflected the population of 2 Million that Yinchuan is supposed to have. It was busy but now crowded. Small local businesses thrived with street vendors and small eateries along the streets.

Integrating the Daily Life: Houses, Offices, Shopping, Schools, and Mosques

What was evident from seeing the tall buildings – largely unoccupied in the new part of town was that it was funded by State machinery and not done by private builders. As we moved into the older part of town, the buildings were more than 50% occupied and in the oldest parts of town it seemed full of people, as expected. The quality of construction of everything was really good even when it was Government buildings and Government owned residential quarters. There seemed to be houses of different sizes and amenities. The buildings were spread across the entire area interspersed between office complexes and shopping complexes. This mixed use area planning had been the cornerstone of Smart Compact Cities and area development concepts.

These shopping areas were interspersed with residential and office areas. For the size of the city, there were a few high-end malls and several shopping complexes that housed many stores. There were many small street shops on the lower levels of office buildings and outside the walls of the residential complexes. Having gone around 10 different large blocks, I could pretty much get everything I wanted within walking distance from each block. The planners had thought through how it was important to have shopping and offices close to residential areas so that it was convenient for people.

In the two days, I did not see any massive schools or maybe I did not notice them since it was a weekend. However, I went past two small schools in the older part of town and both seemed to be local schools. What caught my attention was automated entry and RFID readers at the gates for recording entry and exit of children and school buses.

The large Muslim population of Yinchuan was evident by the number of large and small mosques in the city. And these too were built to scale. The designs were also largely locally influenced. The rest of the population was Buddhist and their temple pagodas were also visible from a distance. Bringing in places of worship inside the planning of town was a highly smart way of integrating city lifestyles with heritage and culture.

Cleanliness

Every intersection had more than one cleaner to keep the road clean. The cleaners were on bikes and with a carry bag. They would pick up anything that was on the street and sidewalks into their carry bags and occasionally they would empty their bags in garbage bins which were places conveniently every 50 meters on the sidewalk and always two bins with segregation of waste. To empty these bins, there were electric scooters with a small dumpster in the back. These small vehicle transporters and larger trucks would bring garbage to a location under a public parking lot where it was being concentrated and compacted. I saw a sewage treatment plant and Waste to Energy plant in the outskirts of town where we had gone to see some ancient Xia Tombs. People were not throwing things everywhere even in the busiest parts of town. Hi-pressure water tankers were cleaning the roads and also the trees once a day.

In Summary - So Why is Yinchuan a Smart City?

Yinchuan is a Smart City since the planners built the city for next 60-100 years and not for the existing 2 Million people currently residing in the city. It was built for at-least 15 Million more people. It was built for 10 times the number of cars and 50 times the number of cycles and two wheelers. They did not add technology for the sake of technology. It was smart because concepts of modern urban planning were carefully chosen and implemented. Office complexes and houses were intermixed with schools, shopping complexes, mosques and neighborhood shops. This would have reduced commute times for most people and residents going about doing their daily chores and going to work. It is smart since every school had tracking of buses and children. It was smart because there was adequate parking for all residents inside the buildings and outside all malls and public spaces and this included parking for two-wheelers and cycles in every street. It was smart because it planned automation and used very few people (even when China has a lot of people) in every process of the city.

It was smart because of the effective use of public unused spaces for solid waste collection and compaction in a discrete manner. It was smart because of the use of electric scooters and electric cycles for most people to travel on the wide side lanes fast. It was smart because its citizens were following rules. BRT stations were in the center of the street like everywhere else but this was just touching the zebra crossings so people could just use the same traffic light and street crossings instead of in the middle of the road. Yinchuan is smart since it has used its water bodies effectively to plan healthy lifestyles with cycling and walking pathways and community gathering areas. Yes, the people are not there but the planners have imagined a city 20-30 years later and put foundations and actual structures in place today. Small and big interventions made Yinchuan Smart. Collective design consciousness made Yinchuan smart, not extraordinary amount of technology. There was an overarching design that held the city together. Someone was thinking through things. Yinchuan was smart due to Integrated Thinking.

Dr Sumit Chowdhury is the Founder & CEO of Gaia Smart Cities, an internet of things telecom solutions company based in India.  

Please contact him on [email protected]