Editor’s note: Xiongan New Area was officially established on April 1, 2017, and was “personally decided, deployed and promoted by Xi Jinping.” This national-level new district, dubbed the “Millennium Plan” by Chinese officials, is adjacent to Beijing and Tianjin. It consists of Xiongxian, Anxin and Rongcheng Counties, which are almost a blank slate for development. It embodies Xi Jinping’s vision of China’s “Greater Development” The solution to “urban diseases” also outlines the official imagination of future cities.
Duan Media visited Xiongan many times in 2017 and 2018 to record how this top-down city-building movement was implemented and how it affected ordinary people living in it. In 2023, on the occasion of the sixth anniversary of the establishment of Xiongan New Area, we visited Xiongan again and saw new buildings and old people, as well as the fate of individuals rising and falling in the “Chinese Dream”.
Yang Lu wants to buy an apartment in Xiongan.
This is her life plan after moving from Beijing to Xiongan in 2021: buy a car, buy a house, and have children.
Today, the project is just ⅓ complete. Yang Lu and her husband Zhang Junming rented a two-bedroom apartment of more than 120 square meters in Rongdong, Xiongan. Rongdong, formerly part of Rongcheng County, is a comprehensive urban area in Xiongan New Area that focuses on residential functions. A large number of resettlement houses have been built for the relocation of local villagers.
Nearly a hundred identical high-rise buildings are arranged in a community equipped with playgrounds and gardens. It’s past seven o’clock at night, there are very few lighted rooms, and there are even fewer people walking around. Whether it is the thin saplings, the sparse sounds of children playing, or the angular steps, they all reveal a newness that has not been soaked by firewood, rice, oil and salt.
Yang Lu invited me to sit at her house. The home is clean and bright, with fine decoration and simple furniture. There is also a bedroom dedicated to a fitness room.
“It’s all good.” Yang Lu smiled. She has the face of a good student, with delicate eyebrows and fair complexion. When she speaks, her voice is crisp and her thoughts are clear.
Yang Lu is in her early thirties and is from Tangshan, Hebei Province. After graduating with a master’s degree, she worked in a think tank under a government department in Beijing. The work is not too busy and there is no need to sit in the office. Although there is no establishment, the treatment and benefits are the same as those of colleagues who have establishment. Yang Lu and her family are very satisfied.
After the job was settled, her family began to urge her to go on a blind date and introduced Zhang Junming. Zhang Junming is from Xushui, Hebei Province and works in a central enterprise in Tianjin. Yang Lu thought “this guy is okay” and started talking about marriage.
The shopping mall in Rongxi resettlement area is sparsely populated.Photo: Lin Wenqing/Duan Media
Then a question arises: Where will you live after marriage?
If you choose Tianjin, buying a house will be very embarrassing. The factory where Zhang Junming works is built far away from human habitation. If you buy a house in the city, it will take more than an hour to commute to and from get off work every day. Besides, Yang Lu doesn’t like Tianjin either.
Choose Beijing. You can’t afford a house or raise a child. Zhang Junming wanted to keep his job at a central enterprise and could not move to Beijing.
The two discussed for a long time, and Zhang Junming said: Why not go to Xiongan.
It kind of means “smart city”
Yang Lu didn’t know much about Xiongan and had only seen it on Xinwen Network. Xiongan is a sub-center of the capital and a national-level new district designated by Xi Jinping in 2017. After the news was released that year, a large number of Beijingers rushed to buy real estate with cash overnight – that was an era when housing prices were still booming, and the authorities immediately froze all local real estate transactions.
After this wave of “attempted real estate speculation” craze, Xiongan gradually faded out of people’s sight. Several years have passed. How has Xiongan been built? Yang Lu and Zhang Junming decided to investigate.
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2023-12-28 23:05:34
