From: George Luk
Date: 2013/5/20
Subject: Fwd: 香港的願景（７５）－立體城市（4）
To: "Mr. Li Wei" , "Mr. C Y Leung"
李偉先生／梁振英先生：
1. 現代城市管理是一門博大精深的學科，包括的範疇極廣，
細小
易生壓迫感，容易令人產生磨擦。
2. 大約一年前，著名的 The Atlantic（大西洋雜誌）有一篇值得介紹的文章："One Mega-City, Many Systems : The Evolution of Hong Kong ------
http://www.theatlanticcities.
3. Indeed, Hong Kong is quickly becoming the hub of a new version of the "one country, two systems" motto used by the mainland to characterize its relationship with Hong Kong, Macau, and Taiwan. The cluster of cities around (and including) Hong Kong forming the Pearl River Delta – from Shenzhen and Guangzhou in the north to Macao and Zhuhai to the west – are becoming an archipelago of inter-locking hubs with varying policies related to visiting, immigration, business and political freedom. Call it "one mega-city, many systems."
4. This increasingly integrated urban cluster of almost 100 million souls constitutes China’s mostly densely populated urban corridor. Some experts say it’s actually the biggest city in the world, even if it bears several names. Like an archipelago of islands growing closer rather than farther apart, the Pearl River Delta’s main cities are fusing into a de facto mega city-state that easily would sit in the G20. The Pearl River Delta is China’s wealthiest zone, with an aggregate GDP of over $800 billion, slightly larger than that of the Netherlands.
5. But far from being unified, the Pearl River Delta region is the foremost model of the future multi-tiered pan-urbanism, a mega-cluster of diversified regulatory districts: physically linked but acting almost like micro-states unto themselves. In a single day, you can cross from Hong Kong, an open society with aggressively free media, to more state-directed but still very global Shenzhen or less-glitzy Dongguan, to the freewheeling and somewhat sleazy gambling haven of Macau, or the tax-free master-planned Zhuhai/Hengqin. Along the way, you will go through checkpoints ranging from full-fledged border crossings requiring visas to light security checks.The journey reveals the different constitutions and political priorities playing out even as the Delta region physically becomes ever more one single city.
6. What makes the Pearl River Delta unique is its variety of policies and political systems in one city. New projects are carefully located in order to benefit from any combination of different districts. The new Macau University currently under construction, for example, lies on the (mainland) island of Hengqin, which in turn is a new tax-free, special development zone within Zhuhai. That university, however, is connected by a dedicated bridge with Macau, therefore enjoying Macau SAR’s (Special Administrative Region) liberties such as uncensored Internet and rule of law. The massive influx of tourists and visitors – almost 40 million to Hong Kong alone each year, including 25 million from the mainland – hasn’t deterred this fragmentation of legal codes and economic arbitrage.
7. We often envision mega-cities as endless urban-scapes of shifting aesthetics and communities, co-existing despite differences, the liberated “city-zen” being a denominator of solidarity. But as the Pearl River Delta reveals, （１）infrastructure can connect but also restrict, and （２）technology can regulate as much as it eases flows. （３）Should the authorities perceive security hazards, even a mega-cluster seemingly unified physically could quickly come to look like the walled dystopia of Hollywood films such as In Time. Or, as an official representative grinned during a recent site visit of Zhuhai's Hengqin Island: "One island – two policies!"
Best Regards,
George Luk
沒有留言:
發佈留言