People and place

To avoid being a pure gentrification process, the project aims to support the local low-income people, documenting their situations and requirements through door-to-door interviews and measuring, and improving their life quality by upgrading accessibility, infrastructure, public services and living spaces. Responding to contextual and aesthetic impact, the project explores the micro-scaled, decentralized, prefabricated technologies in planning and design, to protect the historic physical setting at most. And the pilot housing units are also fitting well into the traditional local architectural modular both in plan and in section, and make a positive contribution to the cultural expression.

Prosperity and progress

Compared with previous high-cost remove-rebuild development, the approach of this project is economically feasible. The municipal government will secure the financing of all public products construction and maintenance. The pilot housing units will control the cost under USD 20,000 each, which will be covered by government for the basic core parts and also be paid by private owners for their personalized option parts. The project demonstrates an innovative concept in integrating different stakeholders and disciplines to work together under a micro-perspective community renewal, and trying to maximize the minimum back to the urban level. This comprehensive approach could be transferable as blueprints for similarly challenged social and built environments in and out of China.

Planet

The project exhibits its energy-saving and low-emission concerns by densifying the land use, encouraging public transportation, adding on wall insulation, changing of old doors and windows, etc. The infills of toilet modular and sewage system will also reduce the risk of environmental pollution.