Shanghai urban agglomeration and the spatial structure transformations of its central area: decline and renovation

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to examine the spatial structure of the city of Shanghai, located in the People’s Republic of China, highlighting the evolution of the land use change in the center of the agglomeration, starting from the economic reforms. We will see that the change in political economy, brought about by the introduction of market mechanisms, had three main effects both direct and reciprocal on the urban fabric: decentralization, expansion and remodeling the urban structures. By doing so, we will try to elaborate arguments that support the idea that its new economic level, made possible by planning decisions and resulted in the economic reforms of the late 1980s, brought significant changes to the political economy of urban development. As a result, the changes have determined the process of accelerated substitution of land uses, with the radical recovering of existing structures for new uses of capital.

Keywords:
Shanghai; land use; planning; urban development; urban structure