In China, some new cities are ghost towns FEATURE 05/20/2011

In China, some new cities are ghost towns

FEATURE

05/20/2011
KANGBASHI — In China’s Inner Mongolia, Kangbashi district offers residents “new modern” living, with tree-lined streets, shiny apartment buildings, vast parklands, restaurants and even a motor racing track.

But seven years after construction workers broke ground on the arid plateau, most of the apartments appear empty and the wide streets are almost deserted — earning Kangbashi the tag of “ghost city.”

The new section of Ordos city on the edge of the Gobi desert was designed to accommodate about 300,000 people but residents say fewer than one-tenth of that number live in Kangbashi. Estate agents insist the number is much higher.

New districts like Kangbashi are springing up across China as the world’s second-largest economy undergoes an unprecedented urbanization process with hundreds of millions of people heading to fast-growing metropolitan areas.... MORE
Source:  The Daily Tribune

URL: http://www.tribuneonline.org/commentary/20110520com6.html