Abandoned city in China. Ordos is a Chinese “city of the future” that has turned into the largest ghost town. Versions about the reasons for the appearance of ghost towns in China

Why do the People's Republic of China continually build large and well-designed settlements in which no one lives?

On satellite images countries, every year new ghost towns appear, which consist of administrative and office buildings, sports stadiums, parks, residential high-rises, houses and towers, interconnected by deserted roads, along which only cars of builders and government officials drive (esoreiter.ru).

One might think that here, as in Pripyat, radiation disasters occurred that forced the townspeople to leave their homes. But in fact, it’s possible to live here: all the necessary infrastructure is available, and the residential buildings are modern and comfortable. Billions of dollars were spent on the design and construction of each such city. Although it is strange that many ghost towns are located in the most unfavorable regions of China, poorly developed by humans and very far from large enterprises and trade routes.

Versions about the reasons for the appearance of ghost towns in China

Chinese journalists report that about twenty ghost towns are currently being built in China, and the number of unoccupied new houses is approaching seventy million. According to one theory, such settlements represent a kind of reserve fund for the population. Let's say the third one starts World War. Shanghai, Beijing, Chongqing and other large cities will be at risk of bombing, and then their residents can be evacuated here. Ghost towns have bomb shelters for many thousands of people, and in such reliable shelters you can even survive a nuclear attack.

Another version says that the spontaneous construction of empty cities is an anti-crisis measure by the government. In much the same way, in the thirties of the last century, Franklin Roosevelt led the United States out of the Great Depression. At the direction of the president, roads, hospitals, schools and prisons began to be built in America. This made it possible to overcome unemployment and bring the country out of a difficult situation. The only difference between the United States and China is that the Chinese decided not to wait for the financial crisis and began to do the same in advance, thereby possibly preventing a possible economic collapse.

There are tens of millions of construction workers in the Middle Kingdom, and they need to constantly work to feed their families. In addition, the reserves of industrialization in the Asian state are almost exhausted, the gross domestic product stops growing, while the country's economy is tightly tied to borrowed funds. An internal crisis can strike at any moment. The current Chinese megacities will be its first victims, and then ghost cities will come in handy as new investment sites. And this will not be military, but economic settlement due to alarm.

By the way, not all of these cities are completely deserted. For example, Ordos, the largest of them, is already inhabited by several thousand Chinese citizens. This is a real metropolis, in which there are empty libraries and supermarkets (but with librarians and sellers receiving salaries), empty buses, and deserted amusement parks. Such a place - real paradise for social phobes and misanthropes. You can walk or ride a bike around the city all day without meeting a single living soul.

Video: Why are ghost towns built in China?

Vision of China's territorial policy towards neighboring countries difficult to understand at first glance. Over the past decade, the country has been ahead of many competitors in the development of industrial industry and economic potential. She has introduced the latest developments in scientific, technical and engineering thought in all spheres of her life. However, it is disconcerting that, despite the obvious success of development, over time, dead cities China. Having studied this issue for many years, the Institute Far East RAS asks the question: why does China want to expand its territories? After all, he has already received some islands for a free economic zone, the so-called “resettlement programs” and has a prolongation of the development of backward regions of Russia.

What empty cities in China are known about?

The “celestial kingdom” itself has in reserve over 60 million newly built apartments and houses with all the amenities and infrastructure “with the latest technology” (parks, stadiums), which, if necessary, can accommodate half of the residents of the post-Soviet space. They are distributed among more than 15 uninhabited cities, among which the main ones are:

• Xishuan;
• Ordos;
• Kangbashi;
• Tianducheng;
• Thames Town.

Xishuan City erected in one of the harshest areas weather conditions area - in the middle of the desert in Inner Mongolia. Has external similarities with tragic famous city Pripyat. With rare exceptions, you can see the light in any apartment - there are only a few people here. But the abandoned homes have not been looted - this is largely due to the death penalty law in force in the country.

Highly developed ghost town of Ordos built in 2001 on land rich in mineral resources. This is not a previously abandoned village, but huge areas of empty square meters of completely livable housing. Most of this real estate is sold out even at the start of construction, however, the Chinese themselves are not eager to move in there. They know better places to live, for example, the village of Bama in southern China, where natural and climatic conditions, together with the infrared rays of the sun, the highest activity on the planet, allow you to live over 100 years without disease, spending your time in the desired way.

Kangbashi – Big City, which, if there were a population, would number over a million people. It is located near Ordos and was supposed to serve as an urbanization zone for peasants, however, due to the lack of prospects, residents were forced to move to more profitable regions. The time it will take for the city to be at least half populated is unknown.

Tianducheng . The suburb of Guangzhou is famous for its copy Eiffel Tower, however, attempts to make the region something like Paris were unsuccessful. Housing prices here are quite high, and the lack of infrastructure completely eliminates the possibility of people settling here. A few local residents are trying to survive on little, so vegetable plantations can be seen even near the city’s architectural monuments.

Thames Town . Due to the city built in 2006, it was planned to expand the scale of Shanghai, but the designer made a mistake. As a result, the predominant number of buildings were one-story houses, which contradicted the original idea of ​​​​settling a large number of residents into the new territory. Currently, only 10% of the area is populated: the Chinese use the constructed dwellings only for country holidays.

China is one of the most densely populated countries and the first largest on the globe. This gives him a lot of problems, forcing him to resort even to the legislative level. Therefore, the fact of construction of such a number is even more paradoxical empty cities in China, some of which claim to be megacities.

Possible reasons for the creation of dead cities

Why do the Chinese allow vast areas to remain empty? Are there really no people among the millions who want to fill these cities? There are several explanations for this phenomenon:

• Most local residents, especially the younger generation, do not have the financial resources to purchase their own home. In terms of the ratio of the cost of an apartment to the average salary, an ordinary Chinese will need about 60 years of work to make such a desired purchase. And those wealthy owners who are able to purchase such properties already have enough real estate to afford living in elite regions. Many refute this opinion, saying that the “heavenly empire” (and now also the construction one) has impressive cash reserves, allowing them to wait for full settlement in abandoned cities of China not to the detriment of the country's capital, even if they remain empty for 5-10 years. This may be so, but here we are talking about the predominant part of the population.
• The policy of the authorities who gave instructions not to settle anyone in these cities. Millions of tourists will bring new buildings and streets to the level of everyday Beijing and Shanghai, further worsening the sanitary conditions of the metropolis. After all, it is precisely because of a misunderstanding of culture, life and the manner of behavior inherent only to the Chinese that representatives of the Caucasian race prefer to limit themselves only to traveling to this country, and not to live here permanently.
• Some of the cities may in the future be designated for people of non-traditional sexual orientation. The crux of the problem lies in the birth control law. Using early pregnancy detection methods, the Chinese began performing abortions in cases of potential female births. As a result, there was a shortage of women, and then an overflow of the population with men. Therefore, it has become commonplace in the country a large number of homosexuals. It is possible that abandoned cities in the future may be intended specifically for such human territory.
• The construction of the listed cities is an investment of accumulated Lately money supply due to the rapid growth of the economy for the subsequent resettlement of their own citizens there: workers of factories, factories and workshops, who will not neglect mortgage lending.
• And finally, the theory of the military concept, characterizing the true face of the “Eastern friend” and returning to the understanding of the motivation for building the Great Chinese wall. Apartment and private buildings, as well as infrastructure facilities with basement bunkers for shelter, designed for hundreds of thousands of people. Together with the wide concrete roads towards Russia that can withstand the load of heavy equipment, they suggest a possible attack from China, and the devastated cities, in this case, suggest the creation of backup housing for the surviving soldiers after a nuclear counterattack. It is likely that such “threatening” buildings could have served as a lesson from someone else’s mistake - the experience of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

To summarize this topic, one thing you need to understand is that all these cities are multi-billion dollar investments, so they are abandoned only for a while. It is difficult to predict an event that will precede the global settlement of empty territories.

Deserted city streets with dilapidated houses and drafts running between them are a favorite theme of the authors of numerous “horror” films. However, for residents of China, such pictures are quite normal. More than a dozen ghost towns have been built in the country, and it seems that the Celestial Empire is not going to stop there. Knowing that some localities in China are facing serious problems regarding the obvious “oversupply” of the population, one cannot help but be perplexed.

How does it happen that empty and overpopulated megacities coexist on the territory of one country? However, journalists, politicians, travelers and simply curious people have been trying to find the answer to this question for several years now. The Chinese themselves say that the appearance of each of these ghost towns was the result of erroneous forecasts by local authorities. In their opinion, the wrong development of total urbanization is to blame. Despite the persuasion of the government and simply incredible conditions, representatives of the 700 million peasant population living in the country are very reluctant to agree to move.

However, there is another opinion regarding the construction of such settlements. Some political scientists and economists believe that they are part of a grand plan for the country's future development. As China's population continues to grow rapidly, the local government is building cities for the future. Experts are confident that the country's authorities are making profitable investments in the future, while simultaneously taking care of their people and expecting to benefit financially from the sale of real estate in the future. Let's get acquainted with the most interesting ghost towns in China, which today are objects of interest for tourists from all over the world.

Tianducheng: fake Paris, doomed to emptiness

The first object of our acquaintance will be a small suburb of the Guangzhou metropolis. Constructing a miniature copy of the largest European capital, local authorities hoped to attract not only a large flow of tourists, but also a large number of permanent residents.

However, the calculation turned out to be inaccurate, since the cost of real estate in the suburbs often even exceeds the prices for housing and business premises in Guangzhou itself. As for the aesthetic appeal of the city, the forecasters made a mistake here too. Yes, indeed, tourists are very attracted to this place.

However, a large influx of guests requires a well-developed infrastructure, and local labor is required to maintain it.

It turned out that the peasants, on whom the Tianducheng designers relied, were practically indifferent to the beauty of the Eiffel Tower model. They neglected the architectural value of the site and unanimously turned nearby squares into garden plots.

Thus, the project, magnificent in its architectural value, turned out to be completely unclaimed, giving birth to one of the ghost towns of China.

Thames Town: the ghost of London 30 kilometers from Shanghai

The next unusual ghost town in the sky is Thames Town. Already from the name of this populated town one can guess the specifics of its architecture. The city was built in 2006 as part of Shanghai's expansion plan.

The main mistake of the designers was the complete discrepancy between the goals of the project (to provide housing for as many residents as possible) and its implementation (the predominance of low-rise buildings).

As a result of this miscalculation, the bulk of the property was purchased by wealthy families as country cottages. Thus, there was simply no one in the city to work on infrastructure facilities.

Therefore, another architectural project, excellent in its idea and implementation, failed miserably. Now in Thames Town, instead of the planned 10,000 residents, less than 2,000 live.

The only profit comes to the city treasury from tourists and newlyweds who like to take pictures on the quiet “streets of old London”, leaving the crowded dusty highways of Shanghai for a while.

Kangbashi: China's largest ghost town and the authorities' most unsuccessful project

Our review of failed projects in China's urbanization program ends with the ghost town of Kangbashi. It was built 20 kilometers from the multimillion-dollar settlement Ordos, located in the province of Inner Mongolia.

The purpose of building this millionaire city was mass relocation peasants associated with the coal rush of the late 20th century. Numerous mines have opened across the province, and authorities have urged residents local villages actively support promising industry.

Residents of Kangbashi are not familiar with traffic jams

However, not everything went as smoothly as desired. Firstly, many mines turned out to be completely unpromising and were closed after several months of operation.

Secondly, the location chosen for the construction of Kanbashi is unattractive from the point of view climatic conditions. In addition, the human factor played an important role. Despite numerous persuasions from the authorities, the provision of benefits and simply ridiculous housing prices, many peasants flatly refused to leave their homes.

Government building... EMPTY government building

Thus, by 2016, instead of the expected million inhabitants for which the city was designed, about 30,000 people live here. At the same time, many of them moved to Kangbashi, to put it mildly, “under pressure.”

Looks like bike rentals are nearby shopping center obviously not popular

Several surrounding villages were demolished. To replace demolished houses Chinese government provided peasants not only with housing, but also with financial compensation. However, not everything went smoothly here either.

Dilapidated cottages are located throughout the outskirts of the city

As they say, “we are responsible for those we have tamed.” Therefore, after the resettlement of ordinary village residents who did not “suffer” from city habits, the authorities had to direct all their efforts to teaching the new settlers the basic rules.

National Museum Kangbashi

Thus, Chinese official Lu Xiaomei talked about how they have to distribute brochures among displaced people about how “... not to shit on the side of the road, not to spit on the asphalt and not to wash your hair in a public toilet.”

Gradually, the peasants who moved to Kangbashi accept the new rules. However, most of them still believe that falling head over heels with sand dune much more interesting than visiting a museum or library.

Sand dune skiing is still the main entertainment for city residents

Therefore, today the city is still classified as a ghost town. It remains more of an interest for tourists than as an industrial center of the region.

Dilapidated stadium

These are the Chinese ghost towns. Why the Chinese built them and continue to build them remains a mystery to us. If you have an opinion on this matter, be sure to share it in the comments. Perhaps it is your idea that will help humanity solve this mystery!

Chinese ghost towns: what do deserted neighborhoods hide? updated: April 20, 2019 by: Yuri Bokovnya

Very little information about these cities gets into the media, because this could worsen the situation in the housing market. But, despite this, specialists from Peking University were able to draw up a map showing ghost towns. Still, we decided to look at seven huge ghost towns in more detail.

Some time ago John Maynard Keynes- the famous economist suggested digging holes and filling them up again as a cure for the economic recession.

Chinese government decided to take this advice and develop it to perfection. Thus, ghost towns began to appear throughout the Celestial Empire, which helps Chinese residents solve a series of problems: unemployment dropped to 4-5% also every year many millions of peasants move to ready-made cities, constantly the local budget is replenished due to apartment sales.

But the Chinese sages did not take into account the speed of the emergence of new cities. The created cities do not have time to populate the inhabitants and the cities are empty, which brings to mind thoughts of ghostly castles.

With the advent of the financial crisis, the situation of China's ghost towns worsened as the country began producing cement in huge quantities. This process could not be stopped and therefore the state decided to continue building cities.

Yingkou

Liaoning Province is dependent on mining. Therefore, the decision was made to rebuild the economy as this would change the situation: the Chinese government directed finance into new industries, and construction companies quickly began building housing for employees. The city was built very quickly, but there are no residents in it still.

New Hebi

Hebi is the capital of Henan Province. This city existed thanks to coal mines. But after some time, a new deposit was discovered near Hebi. This prompted the city authorities to create another industrial zone - “New Hebi”. For twenty years, no one has mastered the new territory.

Thames Town

In this town it was decided to reproduce British countryside. The city was designed by an American architect Tony Mackay. Real estate was snapped up by wealthy people as worthy investments. Due to the fact that real estate prices in this town have risen sharply, this has discouraged ordinary people, and on this moment Thames Town is a place visited by tourists.

Tianducheng

This city is built in Zhejiang Province. This town can also be called little Paris. But unfortunately, there are no residents in this city either, despite the fact that the copy of the Eiffel Tower looks almost real.

Chenggong

The city of Chenggong was built due to the huge number of students. It was planned to build huge high-rise buildings with hundreds of thousands of residential apartments. Locals bought most of the housing as an investment, but no one began to live here.

Caofeidian

Caofeidian was supposed to become the first super-eco-friendly city. It was built several hundred kilometers from Beijing. This city planned to use only renewable energy. The goal of the people living in this city is to show how good an environmentally friendly life is. Despite 90 billion invested in the construction of the city, it remains empty.

Ordos

Ordos - major center autonomous republic Inner Mongolia. The Chinese government decided to expand the city, locating a new district nearby, Kangbashi. It was expected that about a million people would live in the new area, but at the moment the population of the area is only twenty thousand.

Endless blocks of high-rise buildings in which no one ever lived, abandoned amusement parks in which no one had fun, empty giant shopping malls where nothing was ever bought, deserted avant-garde theaters and museums in which there were no spectators, wide avenues along which cars are driving.

In the Google Earth photo - huge EMPTY CITIES are connected by a network of EMPTY roads. Some cities are built in the harshest weather areas of China (Sishuan was built IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DESERT in Inner Mongolia)!

What is this? A strategic mistake by the country’s authorities, who inflated a huge “bubble” in the real estate market, or secret plans calculated several years in advance, known only to China.

It all looks like a giant film set for a science fiction movie in which a neutron bomb explosion or a virus COMPLETELY DESTROYED PEOPLE! But skyscrapers, stadiums, parks and roads remained completely untouched.

Since 2000, China has been building more than 20 new modern cities EVERY YEAR, but they remain UNPOPULATED!

Today that is more than 64 million EMPTY HOUSES (not apartments)!

In 2010, Chinese media reported that the State Electric Network of the People's Republic of China monitored electricity consumption in 660 cities over six months and found ZERO READINGS on the electricity meters of 65.4 million apartments - which means NO ONE LIVES HERE!

These apartments are enough to accommodate more than 200 million people.

Every year, China is increasing its military budget; now it is equal to 78 billion dollars, and “the hidden part of it can be another 30-40 percent of this amount.” The army and navy of the People's Republic of China are equipped with the most modern weapons.

For several years now, China has been building broadband roads on a concrete basis towards the borders of Russia; they can withstand the load of heavy military equipment,

According to military experts, when hostilities begin, the Chinese army will be in Khabarovsk in two to three hours.

“The start of large-scale offensive operations along the entire land border and the landing of troops in the north of Russia will end with a complete, quick victory for China and the seizure of Russian territory up to the Urals. After the entire territory up to the Urals is captured, the Russians will be deported beyond the Urals or exterminated. The winners are not judged,” prophesies Alexander Aladdin.

The People's Liberation Army of China (PLA) has 2.25 million soldiers, and in the event of hostilities, it can put up to 208.1 million soldiers, well armed and trained, under arms.

So what are empty cities for? Beijing is openly demonstrating that it is not afraid of nuclear war. Nuclear warheads are the only weapons modern Russia has left over from the USSR, which can somehow deter China’s aggression.

Under all these cities, underground shelters have been built, designed to accommodate hundreds of millions of people. Beijing is making it clear to both Moscow and Washington that it is fully prepared for a nuclear war. Underground shelters are known to be the most effective protection against nuclear explosions and their damaging factors (shock wave, penetrating radiation, light radiation, radioactive contamination).

Today China is the only country seriously ready to wage any war, both conventional and nuclear, and we pretend that this does not concern us.

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