HU Wantai·TALK about Chongqing City

图6 / Figure 6交通基础设施Transport infrastructure

Q1 Chongqing is a famous mountain city and river city, and the urban space is unique. Please talk about the most representative urban space in your opinion?

There are many mountain cities and river cities in the world, but among cities that both have mountains and rivers, both are mountain cities and river cities and with great mountains and cities, Chongqing is the most unique one. The rolling hills make up a “standing” Chongqing.The main urban area of Chongqing (Figure 2—Figure 3), separated by four columns of green mountains, together with the winding Jialing River of Yangtze River, constitute the natural landscape pattern of “one island, two rivers,three valleys and four mountains” .

First, let’s talk about the mountain city. In the main urban area of Chongqing, mountains are widely distributed. Four parallel mountains of Jinyun Mountain, Zhongliang Mountain, Tongluo Mountain, Mingyue Mountain run through the north and south of the city. There are also Zhaishan Ping, Qiaoping Mountain, Yunzuan Mountain and other independent mountains and more than 100 hills scattered in the city. With the four mountains as the main vein, the two urban ridgelines of Eling-Pingding Mountain and Longwangdong Mountain-Zhaomu Mountain-Shizi Mountain, and 40 important mountains in the city and other general hills together form the mountain system spatial pattern of“four mountains, two ridges and forty hills”in the main urban area. The city is built on the mountain and adjacent to Xiajiang River, forming the urban spatial pattern of building the city against mountains, taking rivers as fortresses,taking cliffs as walls and shaping and arranging the city at will with distinctive local features and the the city space pattern of co-existence of mountains, rivers, and the city. In short, “the city co-exists with the mountains” .

Then let’s talk about the river city. We all know the famous Three Gorges, and the Small Three Gorges of Daning River, but few people know that there are also the Small Three Gorges of Yangtze River in the main city of Chongqing,namely, within the main city, Maoer Gorge,Tongluo Gorge, Mingyue Gorge; within Jialing River of the main city, there are also the Small Three Gorges of Jialing River, namely, Libi Gorge, Wentang Gorge, and Guanyin Gorge.

图7 / Figure 7交通基础设施Transport infrastructure

The scenery is very distinctive. Chongqing is crisscrossed by rivers and densely covered with water network. Yangtze River and Jialing River flow into the main city area from the southwest and northwest respectively and flow eastward after converging at Chaotianmen. Yangtze River,Jialing River and 40 first-grade tributaries, and more than 2000 second-grade and third-grade tributaries or gullies and 64 reservoirs have together formed the spatial pattern of water system of “thousands of creeks and hundreds of tides and the convergence of the two rivers” in the main city area.

The unique features of mountain city and river city have three main features:

First, the Yuzhong Peninsula is the most representative of urban symbol of mountainous characteristics of Chongqing. Yuzhong Peninsula is the mother city and birthplace of Chongqing, it is not only a peninsula surrounded by two rivers, but also a mountain stretching from east to west, Fotuguan, Eling, Pipa Mountain constitute the constitute the ridge line of the peninsula,and the altitude difference from peak to the river edge is more than 200 meters. Whether the Chaotianmen where the two rivers meet, or the most distinctive mountain city streets and lanes, or the historic and cultural district such as Baixiang Street, Huguang Guild Hall, Eighteen Stairs, etc., and the Hongya Cave, Eling Second Factory, which are the favorite places for young people, all are gathered in the Yuzhong Peninsula.

Second, the “island, spur, bay, small bay, bei,hao, gorge” formed by water integration and the “cliff, rock, mountain pass, hillock, mountain range, slope, dam, strip of lands, level ground” are the unique geographical features of the mountain city and the river city. Chongqing place names, such as Yuzhong Peninsula,Guangyangmu, Jiangbeizui, Hongya Cave, Caiyuanba, etc., all have extremely strong mountainous feature. Changeable and varied mountain space, not only bears the traces of nature and history, but also imprints in the memory of people’s hometown in mountain city. Everyone can find his own landscape space in Chongqing.Third, integration of mountains and rivers forms a unique landscape of the mountain city. In the island, fantasy, changeful and winding road,interlaced buildings, up-and-down views, all have created the unique emptying experience of mountain land. Outside the island, ups and downs in grand, mountains and rivers in the city, the high-rise buildings surrounding the Liberation Monument form the crown of the city,showing a three-dimensional mountain city. In the evening, against the darkness, the silhouette of the peninsula is further highlighted by the light-colored lights, and the world-class landscape city night scene of Yuzhong Peninsula has become the unique visiting card of Chongqing.At present, the municipal party committee and government are comprehensively carrying out urban quality improvement actions to promote urban renewal and build world-class river banks of two rivers with high standard. In the near future, the Yuzhong Peninsula will glow with more attractive colors and become the pearl of Chongqing, a world-famous landscape city.

Q2 Chongqing is a national historic and cultural city. Please talk about the relationship between cultural inheritance and urban development.

Chongqing, as a national historical and cultural city, has unique urban history and cultural value of natural resources. Historical culture is the soul of city. To protect the city’s cultural heritage as much as it is to cherish its own life, it is the clear demand and earnest expectation of General Secretary Xi Jinping for the protection of historical and cultural heritage. The implementation of the guiding spirit of General secretary Xi Jinping is particularly significant for Chongqing, a famous city with profound historical and cultural heritage. Chongqing municipal party committee and government attach great importance to the protection of history and culture. Secretary Chen Miner has repeatedly stressed that to strengthen the protection of history and culture with higher station position and standards, urban planning can only plan the future if it does not forget the original. The “original” here means historical and cultural protection, and “future” means planning well. Chongqing has a history of three thousand years, with deep historical and cultural connotation and rich historical accumulation. In 1986, the State Council approved Chongqing as the second batch of national historic and cultural cities. The historical and cultural connotation of Chongqing can be summarized as two basic cultures of Ba-Yu culture and, revolutionary culture and 4 characteristic cultures of Three Gorges culture, immigration culture, the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression culture and the united front culture. The Ba-Yu culture originated from “Wushan Man” in the early Paleolithic period and “Wushan Daxi culture”in the Neolithic period 2 million years ago. The regional culture of the eastern part of Sichuan basin, formed in the period from pre-Qin to Ming and Qing dynasties, with Chongqing as the center, is the basic cultural form of Chongqing and an important part of Ba-Shu culture.Chongqing’s revolutionary culture refers to the summation of spiritual wealth, such as aspire after truth, leading, tenacious unbending, openness and inclusiveness, dare to think and act,perseverance, undaunted by perils, not fear the defeat, etc., formed in the process of realizing the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation,especially under the leadership of the communist party of China, in the process of the people of Chongqing striving for the founding of new China, since the opium war of 1840. The revolutionary culture is the most distinctive cultural features of Chongqing. These two basic cultures are a high generalization of the ancient civilization of Chongqing, which can be divided into four distinct cultures: Three Gorges culture and immigrant culture that are important branches of Ba-Yu culture, and the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression culture and the united front culture that are prominent nodes of revolutionary culture. They are all important cultural forms and features that distinguish Chongqing from other cities.

图8 / Figure 8丰富的景观Abundant landscape

Chongqing’s historical and cultural value is reflected in five aspects:

1. Chongqing’s Ba-Yu spirit is an important part of Chinese nation’s independent character and excellent traditional culture. When Xi Jinping participated in the deliberations of the Chongqing delegation during the two sessions of the National People’s Congress, he refined and summarized the history, culture and spirit of Chongqing and made an excellent discussion.During the Warring States Period, Ba Manzi sacrificed himself and, showing his loyalty and faith; During the Song Dynasty and Mongol Empire War Period, the army and people of Ba-Yu were united as one and forever in faith; In modern times, heroes such as Zou Rong, Ge Le dare to sacrifice, rather die than submit; During the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression, Chongqing people courageously fought hard, persistent and dauntless; In contemporary age, Three Gorges millions of immigrants pay attention to the interests of the whole, selfless dedication, all of these have reflected the Ba-Yu spirit of “tenacious unbending, openness and inclusiveness, generous honest”.

图9 / Figure 9丰富的景观Abundant landscape

2. Chongqing is a witness to the progress of Chinese history and its influence on the world.During the Song Dynasty and Mongol Empire War Period in the last years of the Southern Song Dynasty, mountain defense systems such as Diaoyu City, Baidi City, Tiansheng City,especially the Song Dynasty and Mongolia War in Diaoyu City, which have hanged the pattern of world history. At the time of the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression,Chongqing, as the wartime capital of China, the home front of China’s the War of Resistance against Japanese Aggression and the headquarters (Figure 4) of the Chinese theater command of the world anti-fascist alliance, greatly promoted the victory of the World Anti-Fascist War and its own urban development.

3. Chongqing is an important node of cultural integration between north and south China，and east and west China. Due to its geographical advantages, Chongqing is located in the heartland of the interior of China. The Jialing River,an important tributary of Chongqing, originated in Qinling Mountains, Shaanxi, where the Qinling Mountains are located, is the political and cultural center of the Warring States, Qin and Han dynasties and the Tang Dynasty. The Jialing River basin connects the culture of the Yellow River Basin and the culture of the Yangtze River Basin. During the ancient period, many immigrants from Shaanxi, Hubei, Hunan,Guangdong and other places migrated to Chongqing for many times, bringing their regional culture and communion with the local culture of Chongqing, forming the unique cultural charm of Chongqing.

4. Chongqing is the model of the world landscape city formed under the Chinese ecological culture background. It is constructed and developed around the water, the two rivers encircling,the terrain undulating, which has formed the distinct city characteristic and the street lane texture, created a seemingly random and but actually orderly, seemingly free but rhythmic appearance, vividly shows the unique charm of mountain and river city—Chongqing.

5. Chongqing is the gateway to the shipping hub of the upper reaches of the Yangtze River and the industrial and commercial center of the southwest region in modern times.Chongqing is an important node in the Yangtze River basin, and the river longitudinal flow in Chongqing has been the shipping hub and gateway of the upper reaches of the Yangtze River since ancient times. When the port was opened in 1891, Chongqing realized the development pattern of crossriver city along the four banks of the two rivers. Chongqing, established in 1929, built a series of municipal facilities and modern industrial plants, expanding the urban space.In the early period of the founding of the People’s Republic of China, the construction of southwest region laid the foundation of Chongqing’s modern industrial and urban public service facilities system. The threelane construction period promoted the formation of Chongqing’s modern industrial system and modern satellite town system,and Chongqing gradually became the industrial and commercial center in the southwest of modern China.

Q3 What is the most distinctive place in Chongqing?

Chongqing has a lot of unique space places,of which the most characteristic of the mountain city is Mountain City Footpath (Figure 5).Chongqing has been awarded the National Habitat Environment Award, which is dominated by the Ministry of Construction because of the planning and construction of Mountain City Footpath, in large part because of the construction of Chongqing Mountain City Footpath and slow walking system in Chongqing. This year,Chongqing municipal party committee and government took the improvement of urban space quality as the focus of urban development work,and one of the important contents was still the planning and construction of Mountain City Footpath. The Mountain City Footpath originated in the Yuzhong Peninsula. In the past, a part of Mountain City Footpath perpendicular to the contour line was built on the peninsula.The overall plan to upgrade the city also refers to a complete walk-through system composed of waterways and mountaineering footpaths.Mountain City Footpath is a precipitate of Chongqing’s historical culture, which comes from the pattern of the streets and alleys by “four constructions” . As an important part of urban texture, Mountain City Footpath reflects the“background color” of the beauty of urban landscape as well as the “natural quality” of history and humanity. It is the key local area to build a “city of mountains and rivers, place of beauty” . The characteristic of Mountain City Footpath lies in the “Mountain City”,which is winding and zigzagging, rising and falling and with arbitrary occurrence, and the core lies in the “Footpath”, among which the “foot” shows the subject status and slow walking state of human beings, so compared with general urban roads, spatial environmental quality requires more refinement and elaboration. The “path” is the path, bearing different walking activities. According to the geographical environment characteristics, it can be divided into the city footpath, mountain forest footpath, and waterfront footpath.

The mountain forest footpath includes not only the pedestrian walkways but also the pedestrian street and sidewalks of the central area. Mountain City Footpath crisscrossing Chongqing, plays an important role in organizing regional functions and leading urban development, and promotes the development of green and low-carbon urban transportation. By connecting the natural resources and historical and cultural relics of the city, the “cultural footpath” carrying urban memory and nostalgia, the“green footpath” for urban ecology, fitness and rest, and the “cool footpath” for shade and summer vacation and life and leisure can be formed comprehensively.

Mountain City Footpath is also a carrier to accommodate and show daily life. It is not only a very important part of the traffic network of the mountain city, but also a large window of life. It is a place with temperature. The stone steps, corners of the roadway and fort platform and other small scale spaces provide the sense of security of people’s outdoor life; Residents skillfully make use of the space to spill their daily life into the public space, increasing the opportunities for neighborhood communication.Meeting the neighborhood to say hello and chatting, all are the behavior in comfortable distance of footpath produces.

Mountain City Footpath is recognized in many historical images of Chongqing and urban images in modern literature. Since modern times, a number of famous literati who have been sensitive to urban life and have been good at recording urban landscapes, such as Zhang Henshui, Wu Guanzhong, Liang Shiqiu, Feng Zikai and Xu Beihong, have left a great deal of works about the intention of Mountain City Footpath in Chongqing. Among them, the most exquisite and concrete is Zhang Henshui’s works of Travelogue of Chongqing and Memoir of Mountain City, in which, the “Chongqing is built on mountains, the streets rising the hill and falling the cliff”, “Going out requires either going up or down”, “peculiar geographic perspective, you can’t tell unless you are in it”describe the mountain city footpath built according to the mountain and endowed by the potential, which enables people to get the extraordinary experience and feeling of living and sightseeing in Chongqing. In 1941, Liangyou magazine published Chongqing—City of Stone Steps, “The stone steps are symbol of Chongqing, as impressive as its winter fog”, which can be seen that since modern times, Chongqing’s spatial intention has been more focused on “path elements”, paying attention to the human body scale and the creation of four-dimensional spatial mobility.

Now, the Mountain City Footpath is more and more popular with local people and foreign tourists, especially young people. People’s aesthetic has changed. Places they are willing to go are no longer big landmarks and squares that are lively and shocking, but those smiling and rich contents with local cultural genes that grow out of the city itself. They would like to experience the unique living space of the city from the trip.The pleasant scale of Mountain City Footpath contains full-bodied urban landscape detail and interesting taste. Up and down footpaths connects the lively and quiet community public life with the legendary and exquisite historical buildings. You can also encounter mountains and rivers within the square inch of the walking path. The Mountain City Footpath provides us with a more imaginative perspective to feel the body of the earth and re-examine the aesthetics of the city. The streets of the plain city can only wander in parallel Spaces, but the mountain city footpath enables ordinary people to understand and recognize the city with a multi-dimensional and bird’s-eye view pattern.

In addition, Chongqing also has a lot of mountain city unique places, including ropeway crossing river, uphill ladder (such as the crown escalator), ferry crossing river, traffic elevators,high-altitude viewing platform (such as the viewing platform of Huixianlou Tower on the WFC rooftop) and so on.

Q4 What kind of life interest do you think Chongqing residents have? What is this positive effect on shaping the urban space character? Please list a few cases.

We planned the city, and then the city changed us. The landscape of the city has created Chongqing people’s character of “tough, optimistic, open, inclusive and generous honest and frank”, and their interest and hobbies in life are also very extensive. We observed that Chongqing citizens generally enjoy outdoor activities such as mountaineering, walking and fitness.

In daily life, the most representative is to meet friends with “food”. Chongqing people like to eat and create food, of which hot pot and street noodles are the most distinctive style of meeting friends. In previous years, people in Chongqing were also used to drinking night beer after meals. Whether at the corner of the street, on the bridge or on a cold winter night, you can see gourmets in hot afternoons.

Through the people’s general life scene, we have seen Chongqing people’s behavior characteristics of being willing to contact, eager to communicate and close to nature, which provides a sufficient basis for our urban public space design.

A number of footpaths have been built in Yuzhong District, and this humanized design concept has been used in our project to upgrade the public space quality of Qixinggang Street(the third footpath) in Yuzhong District. First,through continuous observation, we find out the types of public life, crowd, behavior characteristics and space-time distribution in the street space, and records the public activities in these spaces. By analyzing these activities, we have mastered the living rules and behavior characteristics of people in this area and then developed a targeted space improvement program.

We adjusted the layout and location of the city furniture, optimized the paving and lighting facilities, created the suitable microclimate(shade, ventilation, vegetation, etc.), and soon saw the effect. Before the end of our construction, the space we reserved for installing seats was already occupied by residents. One year after the renovation, we conducted a public-life survey again at the same time and place, and found that the retention activity increased by 15%, and the retention time increased by 20%.Life-space-architecture, according to this order,plan design and optimize our public space, make our urban space more in line with people’s, and make the city more charming and dynamic.

There are many interesting spaces in Yuzhong District, such as old houses and shantytowns Although they are dilapidated, they are rare houses with mountain city characteristics. They have all been preserved as far as possible and are now being repaired one after another, such as mountain lane, airplane jetty, swallow rock and so on, if such places are not protected, they will probably be gone. It is of great significance to protect them and make good use of them.

Q5 As a famous tourist city, what do you think of the impact of tourists on the quality of urban space in Chongqing?

Tourism is the process of experiencing the world, experiencing life and enjoying the service, and the essence of tourism is the pursuit of a better life. Chongqing is very characteristic in the construction of tourist city. Chongqing,as a three-dimensional city with mountains and rivers, is a natural basement that makes Chongqing appears unique in the large family of Chinese cities on the same expression for a thousand cities.

The municipal government of Chongqing has promoted tourism environment with the promotion of city’s quality, and integrated the concept of the whole-area tourism into all aspects of urban development, focusing on the construction and integration of the city’s overall image through the city’s mainstream culture,taking into account the tourist’s demand for improving the quality of environment such as transportation infrastructure (Figure 6—Figure 7), public service facilities and scenic spots facilities, as well as the tourist’s soft demand for urban public space friendliness, city interest,city identification, landscape richness (Figure 8—Figure 9), urban environmental sanitation,urban convenience, etc. And build a city that is“pleasant to the near and pleasant to the far”.The secretary of Chen Miner has said many times that the whole area tourism is not to make the whole area into scenic spots, but to refine the high standard and quality of tourism into all aspects of planning, construction and management. In order to develop tourism, we must make good use of Chongqing’s resources so that natural, historical and cultural resources become the catalyst for the construction of Chongqing cultural sites.

On the other hand, tourism development also provides higher standards for urban planning construction. During the Golden Week for tourism in May, several tourist attractions in Chongqing have become very attractive places,such as our Hongya Cave, the Yangtze River Cableway, the Liziba Light Rail Crossing Building, and our old factory renovation project -Erling Second Factory. From the long-term and current overall planning perspective, that is to solve the urgent needs and meet the needs of tourists. These sites around the red spots lack of tourism facilities, although there is no space on the plane for these tourist facilities around the popular scenic spots on the internet, but we will use the special advantages of Chongqing’s mountains and add some space vertically to meet the needs of tourists.

The municipal government of Chongqing attaches great importance to the development of cultural tourism and the urban design, the city upgrade, and pays more attention to the contradiction and problems in our city construction from a deeper level. We need to dig deeper into the deep historical and cultural resources of the region, to have a better and more comprehensive improvement and development. Secretary Chen Miner, Mayor Tang Liangzhi and deputy mayor Lu Kehua have arranged to strengthen research in this field and tell the story of Chongqing.For example, the history of Ba-Yu, the ancient city of Chongqing and 17 gates, twelve scenes of Ba-Yu, the Yangtze river and Jialing River.Every subject has a good story. Together with the media and cultural institutions, we will plan and implement it in urban places and spaces,and do a good job in the construction of ecological civilization and the protection, promotion and inheritance of history and culture. We will take the two rivers formed by the Yangtze River and Jialing River as the main axis of urban space and take the space of natural landscape as the axis to plan the urban spatial pattern and enhance Chongqing’s unique value and image.“A city full of mountains and river, a beautiful place” is the characteristic of Chongqing.Chongqing is a word meaning “thousands of miles” and “vast” , in Chongqing “travel thousands of miles” not only enjoy the unique charm of Ba-Yu, but also broaden people’s vision and the mind, enhance the “vast” pattern, this is a spiritual world and value pursuit for the development of Chongqing in the new era.