21st Century (2000–present)

Dongtan Eco-city (unbuilt)

2005– · China · East Asia – China · Ecological, landscape-led, and resilience planning · Planned by Arup for Shanghai
Map showing the long-term vision of the Dongtan Eco-city masterplan on Chongming Island (Arup).
Map showing the long-term vision of the Dongtan Eco-city masterplan on Chongming Island (Arup). · Copyright Arup / Holcim Foundation (credited) · Arup / Holcim Foundation for Sustainable Construction

Core idea

Eco-city on Chongming Island

Why it matters

Early high-profile eco-city vision

Description

A masterplan commissioned around 2005 from the engineering firm Arup by the Shanghai Industrial Investment Corporation for an ecological new town on Chongming Island at the mouth of the Yangtze. Dongtan was conceived as a compact, largely car-free settlement powered by renewable energy, with closed-loop water and waste systems and buffers protecting adjacent wetlands. Despite extensive design work and international publicity, the project stalled and was never built.

Significance

Dongtan was the most prominent early attempt to design a comprehensive eco-city from scratch, and its collapse made it a touchstone in debates about eco-city rhetoric, feasibility and governance in China. It is frequently contrasted with the later, partially realised Sino-foreign eco-city projects such as Tianjin Eco-city, and it shaped critical scholarship on sustainability branding in masterplanning.

What shaped it

Plans it influenced

Sources

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