Chapter 28 3. Find the best temperament of the city

Any city is a three-dimensional manual of the country it belongs to. On the back of urban architecture and urban planning, its culture is written. A city, like a person, has temperament.The so-called temperament of a city, in the final analysis, is determined by its cultural causes.Just like a person's temperament, it must be closely related to the innate cultural inheritance and acquired cultural upbringing.Urban culture affects every aspect of the city, and it must also affect urban architecture and urban planning; what about urban architecture and urban planning is something that urban people feel at home, look out from the window, face it when they go out, and live in it all day long.Everyone recognizes the psychological and physical effects of the environment on people, so it must be admitted that the quality of urban architecture and urban planning often positively or negatively determines the concentricity and happiness index of common people living in a city .The latter point is an important prerequisite for building a harmonious society in the city.

Since urban architecture and urban planning talk about culture, I would like to express my view of contemporary Chinese culture frankly here. China is one of the countries with a long history of cultural development in the world.And this point always makes some of our compatriots hold a particularly self-righteous attitude towards China's modern and contemporary cultural conditions. We admit that we are still a developing country in terms of economic strength, we admit that we are obviously lagging behind developed countries in terms of science and technology, and we admit that we need to improve the quality of civilization of the whole people... We often say that this gap must be shortened, and that gap must be shortened , there is a lesson to be made up, and a lesson to be made up; but when it comes to culture, we seem to be very comforted.

It seems that the only thing we have no gap at all is culture, as if the only thing we should make up for is culture, as if we have a reason to be superior as always in terms of culture. And I thought that was not the case. Anyone who has a little common sense in the history of Western culture knows that from the end of the 18th century to the entire 19th century, it had an important impact on all aspects of the 20th century, known as the enlightenment culture in history.What the Enlightenment culture wants to promote is humanism.Humanism is not only a kind of cultural thought, but also affects all aspects of human sociological thought.Therefore, it is a progressive thought, a civilized thought, and a thought beneficial to mankind.Without the awareness and actual acquisition of civil rights by every citizen, "people-oriented" is just empty talk.

It is precisely at this point that modern Chinese culture clearly lacks a valuable lesson, a lesson of a fundamental nature.In the heyday of Western humanist culture, we were still in the decadent and decadent late Qing dynasty, and humanistic thought was regarded as outrageous.At a time when the historical mission of Western humanist culture has been basically completed, we have just begun the initial "May 4th" enlightenment of humanist culture.Since then, China has been reduced to a country full of disasters, and the "May 4th" Enlightenment almost died prematurely. After 1949, the so-called socialist culture was determined by the political ideas at the time, and it was impossible for it to become an inclusive culture, and it was impossible not to become an exclusive and resistive culture.Just like the Western countries, they also took the same disdainful position and attitude towards the culture of all socialist countries at that time.In China, the culture from 1949 until the end of the 1970s was basically a culture of class struggle.By the time of the "Cultural Revolution", even drinking cups and pillow towels reflected the strong characteristics of class struggle culture. The "Cultural Revolution" ended, and the cultural history of New China has overlapped with its political history for 27 years.Chinese contemporary culture once instinctively tried to carry out the primary enlightenment of the second humanism, but it also fell short.When 40 years or so passed, China has not been able to successfully make up the elementary lesson of humanist culture.Western culture at that time had already entered the post-humanist period.However, nearly 200 years have passed since the initial stage of humanist culture in Sri Lanka.When Chinese culture is ready to seize the opportunity to carry out the second cultural enlightenment of humanism, first the era of cultural commerce sweeps across, and then the era of cultural entertainment suddenly arrives...

Ladies and gentlemen, I am not a blind admirer of Western culture.In terms of culture, I have not had any despicable acts of xenophobia.I just saw the huge black hole of Chinese contemporary culture with my own eyes.I think someone should point out its objective existence, more people should face it squarely, and more people should work together to make up that precious lesson for our contemporary Chinese culture. Mr. Liu Zhongde, former Minister of Culture, we had very friendly contacts.He is a Minister of Culture that I respect.Mr. Sun Jiazheng, the Minister of Culture at the time, was my top leader as a film and television practitioner, and he was also a person we respect very much.In the past 20 years, the Chinese Ministry of Culture has done a lot of valuable cultural development work for China.But how to make up an important lesson of humanist culture as soon as possible is not only the mission of the Ministry of Culture, but also the responsibility of all cultural intellectuals in China.I would like to point out that valuable lesson further.

If we do not make up for it enthusiastically with a pious heart, we will inevitably see all kinds of deficiencies in congenital bad qualities in politics, economy, technology, business, education, culture, and public morality.Similarly, in urban architecture and urban planning, it is not surprising to see various phenomena of quick success and instant benefit.The best temperament of a city is that of humanism.It sets off the back of urban architecture and urban planning, and must also be reflected in architecture and planning. Talking about all things and problems in China often cannot get rid of the trouble of a major premise, that is, China is a country with a population of 1.37 billion, the most populous country in the world. At the beginning of the 19th century, the total population of the world was only a little over 1.6 billion.In such a comparison, the population pressure we are facing often makes people gasp. The great achievements China has made over the past 30 years of reform and opening up are often negligibly divided by the huge "denominator".

In the 20 years from 1949 to the end of the 1970s, in my opinion, China never had any overall achievements in urban architecture and urban planning, but only some individual ones that marked the times. It means nothing more than urban buildings.They stand in very few large cities.Such as the top ten buildings in Beijing in the early years.Take Harbin, my hometown, as an example. In the early 1960s, a "Northern Building" was built with 8 or 12 floors. It was the tallest building in the area north of Tianjin at that time.At the same time, a "Friendship Palace" was built along Yanjiang Road. It is a place for city officials to receive the heads of the central government and meet distinguished foreign guests.Judging by today's star standards, they were barely enough to be "level three" back then.Common cities in a country have not replaced urban buildings in 30 years, which is common in some European countries.Because the large or small buildings in their cities are almost all solid masonry structures; moreover, their populations can often maintain a balance that does not soar for decades.But China is different. From south to north, residential communities are basically civil structures.Some are "surprise achievements" of the "Great Leap Forward" era.Most of the dilapidated houses left over from before liberation have never been remodeled or repaired after liberation.In every city, seventy-eight out of ten buildings with masonry structures are either the mansions of great bureaucrats and warlords before liberation, or evidence of colonialism and aggression by foreign powers.After careful analysis, the formation of some of our compatriots' admiration for foreign countries is actually due to reasons.Think about it, there are not many buildings with civil structures that can withstand more than a hundred years of wind and rain, but some supporting buildings of colonialism and aggression by foreign powers are as solid as rocks in our cities; think about it Comrade Mao Zedong only visited Harbin once after liberation, and stayed only one night. However, his place of residence was the "Guest House of the Central Committee" which was converted from the club of railway officials stationed in Kazakhstan during the Tsarist Russian era.The "Northern Mansion" and "Friendship Palace" were later built in Harbin, which I think must be inseparable from this psychological stimulation.However, the population of New China has surged from 450 million in 1949 to 1.3 billion 60 years later.In cities, three generations share the same room, four generations share the same room, and even share the same bed.The place where some old people sleep is often the so-called "bed" made of several wooden planks behind the pot in the kitchen, which is narrower than the bed in the public bath.The old man fell to the ground in the middle of the night and broke his arm, broke his leg, was burned by the stove lid, died of gas poisoning... I heard such things again and again when I was a child.In many, many cities, there are urban settlements that are more slums than European slums, one piece, one piece, another piece!Every city is actually an extremely arbitrary concept, which often only means a small area in the city center and a few major roads around it.I am the son of the first generation of construction workers in China. A dream I often had when I was a teenager was to finally steal a pot of cement somewhere.Because how I want to put a thin layer of smooth cement on the window sills and pot bases of my home!But until I was 30 years old, I had already left the Great Northern Wilderness where I went to the countryside for seven years, had graduated from Fudan University, and had been assigned to the Beijing Film Studio for two years—the first time I visited my home in Harbin from Beijing , that dream never came true.It was already 1981.Later I wrote an essay "About Cement" in honor of my teenage dream.My father was a representative of the Heroes of the construction industry in the 1960s. One of his inventions was to use some kind of clay from the Northwest mixed with coal ash and bone glue powder to replace cement.When I was in elementary school, a teacher once brought a brick into the classroom, put it on the desk, pointed to it excitedly and told us: "Look, our new China has also made refractory bricks!" The classmate looked at that brick as if looking at a gold brick. I went back to Harbin again in 1985. At that time, my childhood home had sunk more than two feet into the ground. The so-called family in the past 26 years has been connected a little before and a little behind. There are three newly married families of three, plus parents and a mentally ill elder brother, a total of 12 people.Because I went home, my younger brother could only spend the night at the unit.There are nine households in our hospital, all of whom live in cities with almost the same living conditions.The whole street is like that, the front street and the back street are like that.There are eight or nine such and such residential areas in Harbin City, with a population ranging from tens of thousands to nearly 100,000, and the living conditions make people cry!Accounting for about one-third of the city's total population.

And the situation is not like this in Chinese cities, how many were there back then? Ladies and gentlemen, what I want to point out is that China's urban architecture quietly emerged under such a background.From the early 1980s to the early 1990s, no matter whether it was the national construction behavior or the construction behavior of private enterprises, except for buildings listed as key projects and key requirements, the standards were not high as far as residents were concerned.Some can be said to be very low.But even so, how lucky are the urban families living in the buildings in the 1980s!Taking Beijing as an example, the rows of buildings on Qianmen West Street adjacent to the road are all built in the mid-1980s.Many of the predecessors in the literary and cultural circles that we are familiar with have lived there in the past.What was allocated was only two rooms and one living room, three rooms and one living room.Looking at them now, they are so ordinary that they have no architectural style or aesthetics at all.

The rise of the original building materials industry pulled the enthusiasm of the original building materials industry, so it caused the initial industry pollution, and today it seems to be an indisputable fact that it has obviously formed a sequela of urban planning. However, as myself, I would rather have a more lenient attitude than be too harsh.It is no exaggeration to describe the situation as "sending charcoal in the snow".For those who yearn for warmth in the cold, as long as it is charcoal, no matter what is used to hold it, it is something they are grateful for. As far as I know, the rise of the private real estate industry in the north of the Yangtze River should have happened around the 1990s.About half of them are formerly private construction teams; the other half are probably operated by people with one or another power background.After the state-owned units implemented the shareholding system reform, some people from the state-owned construction industry also differentiated to form real estate companies operated by private equity capital.

At first, they were only active on the fringes of big cities, quietly, and did not attract much social attention.The actions are not very big, and do not constitute a direct impact on urban planning-whether it is gratifying or worrying. By the mid-1990s, they began to penetrate deep into the hinterland of the city; it is only in recent years that they have had a violent impact on urban planning. Objectively speaking, compared with the 1980s and 1990s, the quality of urban buildings in this period has improved in many ways.The appearance of the city has been rapidly changed due to the private real estate industry's joining in the construction, and it has benefited a lot.The first batch of people in China who have the financial ability to purchase private real estate also hold affirmative and welcome attitudes towards the emergence of private real estate companies.Around 2000, the private real estate industry sprung up like bamboo shoots after rain, and became the private industry with the most profitable returns.

I personally think that when it comes to architectural style, architectural art, and architectural aesthetics, as far as commercial residential real estate is concerned, neither the requirements are too high nor the evaluation is too low.If the requirements are very high, the price will make ordinary urban residents even more daunting; if the evaluation is too low, it will be suspected of hypocrisy.Whether it is Chinese style, European style, or a combination of the two, in the final analysis, you get what you pay for, and style and art should be traded at a price, which should be regulated by market supply and demand.From my point of view, some extremely high-end commercial houses are not enough, but they are already too luxurious inside and out.In a developing country, a country with a very poor population, and a country where the gap between rich and poor is huge and widening, the continuous launch of luxury houses, and of course they are all grand launch, obviously has a surreal meaning.No matter how humane its quality is, it is only humanized for a very small number of people, and has nothing to do with the vast majority of ordinary people.In Tiantongyuan and Huilongguan communities in Beijing, the buildings there have no special architectural style, art and aesthetics to talk about. They are far away from the urban area, the transportation is inconvenient, and the supporting service facilities are not perfect, but Beijing is eager to live in the buildings there. There are still tens of thousands of people, and they have to go through the qualification examination and approval of relevant departments.Not a determination of wealth, but a determination of poverty. All kinds of bad and worrying phenomena in architectural design and urban planning, of course, I have seen those with my eyes, and of course I also admit that those phenomena have damaged the appearance and temperament of the city itself. But I think that between design and planning, the responsibility for the above phenomena should be mainly attributed to the latter, that is, to the officials in charge of urban planning.Without the approval of the authority, it is absolutely impossible for any real estate agent to start construction anywhere in the city.There is only the approval of power, without the requirement of power, and the approved real estate developers must be happy to do their own thing in terms of design.It is hoped that real estate developers will also consider the harmony between product design and overall urban planning while considering product design. I think such a sustenance is too naive.In terms of design, real estate developers usually only consider the buyer's market for positioning.Sometimes they are very proud of their designs.In fact, looking at some of their designs in isolation, there may indeed be something to be proud of, but in the overall view of urban planning, it may be disharmonious, and may even destroy harmony.Or, it seems that there is no conflict with the overall urban planning for the time being, but it will hinder the overall urban planning from expanding towards a better aspect in the future.Yes, it is this kind of responsibility that I think should mainly be borne by competent officials. For example, a member who is very responsible for his home, when he has the right to sell the land of his home, he will definitely have requirements for the buyer, and even limit the buyer to what kind of house he is allowed to build, and what kind of house he is not allowed to build premises.He will definitely not express such a meaning-"Now, the area of ​​this land in my home belongs to you, you can build it however you want, I don't care at all!" Moreover, which piece of land in my home is sold, He must have thought twice.He must especially cherish every square meter of land.He must always think this way—this piece of land needs to be reserved, and grandpa needs to exercise there every day; that piece of land should also be reserved for the children to play on the swings there; Stay for a while, there must be a green space in your home! ... Our cities lack such responsible, holistic, long-term planners.Even if there is, their sense of responsibility, their long-term considerations, is often wishful thinking.Because that's often the case—some officials are responsible for land sales, and other officials are responsible for urban planning.The former is a high official with real power, and the latter is a small official with virtual power.How much power does the director of the Construction and Planning Bureau have over a city?Often it's nothing more than inspecting illegal buildings and drawing blueprints as directed. A city, whose overall, future, and long-term planning is conceived in who's mind?Where will it be in 20 years? What will it be like in 50 years?What will it be like half a century from now? ——In fact, our city lacks such people who have dedicated themselves to it, let alone such a fixed real authority. The large-scale planning and large-scale urban construction measures in certain cities, even if they benefit one party, are often the public servant behavior of the current first- and second-in-commands who make personal decisions.As a result, negative phenomena are often brought out——the city's construction projects that waste people's money and waste money, and make great achievements. In the end, I would like to say that each of our cities must have a certain kind of fixed planning authority with a high level of planning, composed of officials, experts, scholars and representatives of the public.What it has should be supreme power, above any personal power.Just as the judiciary should override any individual power.It will be accountable only to the people.Cherish every piece of land in the city for the people.It will conceive the overall and long-term blueprint of the city for the people.The phenomenon of individuals selling urban land with privileges should have long been considered illegal.It will more effectively encourage real estate developers to join in the initiative of urban construction, and at the same time more effectively limit their pervasive capital and profit-seeking behavior. And our urban citizens should raise such a legitimate awareness—in the final analysis, the city is the city of the people.The land area of ​​the city is extremely limited.As a special resource, it is especially valuable.Every city citizen has the right to monitor every sale of urban land with open eyes, demanding transparency in the process.Moreover, every urban citizen has the right to question and criticize the sale and use of urban land that he or she considers inappropriate. There is an old saying in China, "Success is Xiao He, and failure is Xiao He". This statement is used to describe the relationship between China's real estate industry and cities, and it has a vigilant meaning for both parties. Without a humanistic mind, it is difficult for a citizen to have a conscious demand for public rights, and it is difficult for a public servant to have a conscious awareness of public rights, and it is difficult for a city to have a rational present and a more humane future.