Suburban in America, Europe and China

Suburbanization is essentially the process of "urban" expansion. People generally do not divide the city center and suburbs administratively, but we can also simply distinguish them through the landscape. The suburban basically composed of a large number of homogenized low-rise residences, and various infrastructure facilities (roads, gas stations, and shopping malls) that are most suitable for residential use. This concept may be more applicable to the Americas than Europe because this “suburb” is not the only choice for urban development in Europe with public transport infrastructure.

                                         Edward Burtynsky, North Las Vegas

If it is the city (center) that corresponds to the suburban, then we may begin to imagine a landscape that is not used in the suburbs: high-rise buildings, commercial office and residential functions are mixed in one block or even the same building, and public transportation is developed. This is closer to the traditional European cities.

                                     Central Amsterdam

Cities and suburbs look different (if you have to separate them). Back to China, our urbanization or urban construction is happening rapidly. The real question for us is: What kind of city should be built? Is it like a European traditional city? Or is it like the suburbs of the United States? Or do we learn from each other's advantages to create Chinese characteristics of socialism? Taking into account our population, our city will certainly not look exactly the same as the United States and Europe: especially in the suburbs - our suburbs will be higher, and each block will be walled.

Fanyu, Guangdong