Imagine it: Eighty thousand citizens in a city designed so that everything is less than a 15 minute walk away. An underground train radiating from the central hub travels to Chengdu and the surrounding area. This new sustainable city was designed by architects Gordon Gill and Adrian Smith from Chicago, Illinois. It is projected to be constructed in China by 2021 and will be the home of approximately 30, 000 families.
Much criticism of the proposal has been vocalized as well. How will emergency vehicles serve the area and how will disasters such as fires be controlled in such a dense city? How will they deal with people who cannot walk or cannot so easily function on a day to day basis including the elderly? You might also be wondering how a city this large would sustain itself with no distribution vehicles of essential items such as food and shelter. Common maintenance alone would be an obstacle.
Named “Great City,” it aspires to be just that. With every green innovation you can think of, this proposed city of 1.3 square kilometres is a hyper-dense urban masterpiece. A seasonal energy storage system which stores summer heat and converts it to power to heat homes in the winter will be employed. The all pedestrian city has been designed to use 48% less energy, 58% less water, produce 89% less landfill waste, and 60% less carbon dioxide. These lofty goals are all a part of Andrian Smith and Gordon Gil’s plan to slash the cliché of the urban wasteland with smog and a stench that most people associate with hyper-dense spaces. The architects want to create a fresh space that serves its people. Their goal is to, “enhance the quality of life of its residents.” Great City holds promise that although we are reliant on cars, we are self sufficient without them.
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