Urbanism vs Suburbia mapping lifestyle-led population agglomeration in Shanghai using time-space

Abstract

The economic development of Shanghai took off at an intense and fast speed since the inception of Open Door policy in 1990; Shanghai people experienced a dramatic enlargement in perceived boundary of city area, as well as steadily increased population. Echoing the discourse by academician world wide, sustainable development emerges as a significant topic for urban sprawl that provokes attentions in the studies of Chinese cities. This study starts from the aspect of residence agglomeration with a purpose to identify forces within home relocation mechanism. It is hypothesized that, different from the phenomenon of ‘Suburbanization’ in western cities, the currently observed massive outward-moving in Shanghai is arguably a temporary compromise to political and economic constraints rather than a response to an ideal life image. This paper describes a survey by questionnaire and interview, which is designed to focus on lifestyle-driven activity pattern, current and probable future choice of home location. Output of the survey suggests that the observed urban sprawl can be better understood as a regional process of urbanization, during which expanding of the CBD and superior residential zone push out the original inner-city residential lands to suburban area. As a result, a large amount of families with lower economic status are filtered out of city; however, driven by the regional attachment to city living, probability of moving back to city can be very high.