Hong Kong stands alongside Singapore, Bombay and New Delhi as being one of the most well known and defining spaces of the British colonial enterprise in Asia. But unlike the aforementioned cities, Hong Kong is unique in its relatively late date of colonization, being ceded to the British in 1841. This places the city in a rather unique period in terms of British colonial urban planning – the ‘Grand Model’ that had dominated the approach to colonial urban planning was reaching the end of its over two centuries long tenure.^[1] Towards the end of the 1840s, arguments that favored a hands off laissez faire approach to urban planning would prevail, and remain dominant going into the tumultuous 20th century.^[2] In short, Hong Kong represents a unique opportunity to evaluate the principles and practice of the ‘Grand Modell’ at its most developed point – and while the Australian city of Adelaide can provide a similar example,^[3] the character of the British colonial project in Australia is sufficiently different to warrant another example. Where in the British colonial projects in places like India and China had relatively powerful and well organized local communities and governments that they were forced to engage with in some way, the Indigenous communities of Australia were systematically excluded and in many cases destroyed.

To aid this analysis, a map of Hong Kong from 1958 produced for the American Mobilgas company^[4] will be used. The reasoning for the use of this particular map is twofold. Firstly, being produced in the late 1950s, the urban environment of Hong Kong has had time to develop, but the pressures of the World Wars and Great Depression would have made the prospect of any new urban designs at best difficult to implement. Secondly, the map being of an American origin lends it an advantage – while it is obviously far from an extremely accurate, unbiased presentation of Hong Kong, it is disconnected from the immediate context of the British and the systems of British colonial administration. It also clearly has a utilitarian purpose, most likely being used by tourists – meaning it is less likely to be a rendition of how Hong Kong ‘should be’ – at least from an urban planning perspective. One important limiting factor that should be mentioned is that the map only covers a small space of Hong Kong – mostly the areas enclosing Hong Kong bay, while the New Territories, Sai Kung, a significant portion of Hong Kong Island and Kowloon have been excluded from the map. The map is also not suitable for discussing the third and fourth principles of the Grand Model that Robert Home describes – we cannot use a map intended for consumption by tourists to give us an insight into whether or not Hong Kong was laid out in advance, nor can we use it to determine the exact size of the many main roads marked on the map^[5].

The first principle of the Grand Model as defined by Robert Home is ‘deliberate’ urbanization – in short, strong central authorities prominent throughout or dominating the urban landscape.^[6] This principle is displayed in the Mobilgas map of Hong Kong, especially on Hong Kong Island itself – the organs of the colonial administration (government offices, post office, police headquarters, barracks) are clustered around two major roads, Queen’s Road East and Queen’s Road Central, while roughly lying in the center of the urban build up on Hong Kong Island.^[7] They also sit in close proximity to the ferry piers that are essential for travel between Hong Kong Island and Kowloon.^[8] It should be mentioned however that this principle does not appear to be as strongly applied to Kowloon – while there is a post office and railway station sitting at the south end of the central Nathan Road, there is little else in the way of administrative organs or buildings symbolic of the British colonial administration on the mainland – something that seems strange at face value given the seemingly larger scale of the urban environment in Kowloon.^[9] In short, the principle of deliberate urbanization in Hong Kong has been partially followed.

The second principle defined by Robert Home is that of land rights allocated in clearly differentiated regions of town, suburban, and country lots, something that Home describes as being definitively tied into the program of deliberate urbanization.^[10] Where the previous principle is displayed in the 1958 urban landscape of Hong Kong, this principle is completely absent. Hong Kong, as displayed in this map, is a nearly totally urban environment, with the few suburban locations having no distinct boundary between themselves and the urban, and the country being not present at all.^[11] The majority of the northern Hong Kong Island displayed on this map is an almost uninterrupted urban sprawl following tightly along the coast line, running from Kennedy Town to North Point, only interrupted by Victoria Barracks and the naval dockyard.^[12] The inset displaying Jardine Lookout has an identifiable suburban structure with small winding avenues and roads, but is directly connected to the bustling urban environment north of it by the Happy Valley Race Course and Stubbs Road^[13]. The layout of Hong Kong Island appears to have more in common with the concept of a treaty port and opposed to a colonial township. Meanwhile, the section of Kowloon displayed on this map is a wall of urban space that seemingly sheers off straight into nothing north of Clear Water Bay Road, Tai Po Road, Kowloon Tong and Kowloon Tsai.^[14] It is worth mentioning that the limitations of the Mobilgas map as a source are apparent in this discussion – as mentioned before, it only covers a small region of Hong Kong, leaving out for example, the fishing villages of Sai Kung, and the expanse of the New Territories. Its purpose as a guide for American tourists may also be a limiting factor – with most of the interest of the map on the urban spaces of Hong Kong, the mapmakers may have simply not bothered to describe in detail the non-urban spaces of Hong Kong. However, even with those caveats in mind, it is reasonable to conclude that there is at the very least a lack of a consideration for the principle of differentiated regions of urban, suburban and country displayed in Hong Kong. This discussion also ties into the eight principles discussed by Robert Home, being that of a clear green space separating the town and the country – for the reasons already discussed above, it is fair to conclude that this principle was also at the very least disregarded.^[15]

The fifth, sixth, and seventh principles laid out my Robert Home – respectively, that of a rectangular, grid based plot layout, the presence of public squares, and the reservation of plots for public purposes^[16] can also be discussed in sum, as they are intertwined with each other due to the condensed nature of Hong Kong’s urban environment. To start, Hong Kong does display a rectangular grid layout, but not a standardized one.^[17] While Hong Kong’s plots are nearly rectangular across the board, all flowing from a main road, they are not standardized, with many subsections of the urban space having different orientations and sizes for their plots – compare, for example, the rectangular layouts flowing out from the nearly parallel Nathan Road and Ma Tau Wei Road in Kowloon^[18]. These layouts are also interrupted at several points by public places – typically gardens, that seem to be centrally located ala a public square^[19]. For example, Southorn Playground in Wan Chai lies at the center of the urban space surrounding Hennessy Road, but in doing so interrupts the standardized grid plots surrounding Hennessy Road and Queen’s Road East.^[20] A more prominent example is that of King’s Park, lying at the center of Kowloon – King’s Park does not conform to any kind of grid layout, and indeed represents a significant break from the sprawling grid layout to its east, west and south.^[21] Taken in sum, I argue this represents an adherence to the spirit of the relevant principles, but does not follow them strictly to the letter. The grandeur and symbolism of a public square at the center of the city is not present, instead with public parks taking their place – spaces of leisure but still symbolic – the name ‘King’s Park’ is in itself symbolic, especially considering it is in the center of the Kowloon urban environment. A grid based layout is present, but its shape and form shifts across the landscape, serving more as a loose guide opposed to a strict commandment. The only principle of the three followed more closely the reservation of plots for public spaces – as some of the public spaces do roughly follow the grid based layout and ‘slot’ neatly in – although this is not universal, as discussed in the case of King’s Park.

To sum up, we can see a mixture of significant deviations from the principles of the Grand Model described by Robert Home in 1958 Hong Kong. There are a number of factors that could contribute to this that I can think of – the first and most obvious is the difficult nature of the landscape in Hong Kong, being a mixture of jungle, mountain and coast that would limit available space and require creative engineering solutions. Another possibility is that the focus of the British colonial project in Hong Kong was not on the land itself, but rather on the bay, harbor and infrastructure surrounding the harbor – this would change the spatial priorities of an urban planner, and perhaps bring Hong Kong closer in spirit to coastal Chinese treaty ports and their bunds, opposed to the settler colonization projects of Australia or Africa. Regardless, further investigation is warranted into the nature of British colonial urban planning – perhaps the Grand Model and its principles can be better thought of as a guideline opposed to a stricter set of rules.

^[1] Home, Robert K. “The ‘Grand Modell’ of Colonial Settlement.” In Of Planting and Planning: The Making of British Colonial Cities, Second Edition., 9–37. Planning History and Environment Series. New York: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2013. 9-10.

^[2] Home, Robert K. “The ‘Grand Modell’ of Colonial Settlement.” 33.

^[3] Ibid. 29-30.

^[4] General Drafting Co. Inc. “Mobilgas Mobiloil Friendly Service Everywhere in Hong Kong.” Separate Map. Standard-Vacuum Oil Company, 1958. David Rumsey Historical Map Collection.

^[5] Home, Robert K. “The ‘Grand Modell’ of Colonial Settlement.” 10-13.

^[6] Ibid. 10-11.

^[7] General Drafting Co. Inc. “Mobilgas Mobiloil Friendly Service Everywhere in Hong Kong.”

^[8] Ibid.

^[9] Ibid.

^[10] Home, Robert K. “The ‘Grand Modell’ of Colonial Settlement.” 11-12.

^[11] General Drafting Co. Inc. “Mobilgas Mobiloil Friendly Service Everywhere in Hong Kong.”

^[12] Ibid.

^[13] Ibid.

^[14] Ibid.

^[15] Home, Robert K. “The ‘Grand Modell’ of Colonial Settlement.” 17-19.

^[16] Ibid. 10.

^[17] General Drafting Co. Inc. “Mobilgas Mobiloil Friendly Service Everywhere in Hong Kong.”

^[18] Ibid.

^[19] Ibid.

^[20] Ibid.

^[21] Ibid.

Chengdu, the provincial capital of the Sichuan region, known as the ‘Country of Heaven’ is located over 1,000 miles west of Shanghai. When one looks on a map of China in its entirety, one can really appreciate Chengdu’s distance from the coast and from other centres of urban progression. Dwyer, citing the Chinese poet Du Fu (712-770), notes the isolation Chengdu has always suffered from.¹

“How hard the road to Shu is!

It is as hard as the road to heaven.”

Despite this, Kristin Stapleton, Associate Professor of History at the University of Buffalo, has contested and analysed how Chengdu developed as an urban environment post 1895 in her book ‘Civilizing Chengdu: Chinese Urban Reform, 1895–1937’.²  Whilst other Chinese cities of this era, like Shanghai, benefitted from the influence of Western settlers and commercial enterprises on urban space development, for Chengdu, with its situation in the heart of the interior, the situation was more complex. This post, unpacking Stapleton’s work, looks more closely at how Chengdu developed into an urban hub, with a population today of over 20 million.

Stapleton notes that although Chengdu was the cultural and commercial beating heart of the Sichuan region, prior to 1895, urban affairs were left ‘largely to the local officials, and maintenance of public order was their chief if not only concern’.³ Up until 1895, and the ‘New Policies’ which were instituted in the early 20^th century, cities were given no real spatial importance in Chinese political discourse and the ways in which they could transform social change were not thoroughly considered. So, what changed and why?

The first flashpoint and catalyst for change in China was the humiliating defeat the nation suffered at the hands of the Japanese in the Sino-Japanese War, culminating in 1895. The harsh terms imposed on China as a result of the defeat, as Stapleton has argued, not only led to a general sense of anger but also a sense that reform was needed urgently.⁴ The ‘New Policies’ of the late Qing period, Stapleton has argued, ‘transformed Chengdu in remarkable ways’.⁵  Although the effects of the reforms were intended to be felt widely, in both rural, municipal and urban environments, it was indeed cities that benefitted most. Closer to pockets of political authority and heightened access to resources resulted in provincial capitals such as Chengdu being ‘showcase’ cities for the reforms, whilst other areas were less prioritised. 

As tends to be the case in many cases of urban development in China, the impact of individual local officials can have a large impact. Stapleton in particular focuses on the influences of Zhou Shanpei, a local advisor and official.⁶  She clearly highlights the five urban changes Zhou himself initiated. Known as the four chang (licensed zone for prostitutes, workhouse for beggars, new theatre and reformed opera and commercial arcade) and one cha (a new police force). Although Stapleton herself attests that Zhou is best remembered for his accomplishments in Chengdu, these changes seem relatively minor in creating a new type of urban space.⁷  Although he was personally interested in modelling Chengdu on the Tokyo model (which in turn had built on concepts and ideas from Paris and beyond), it is unclear what lasting impact Zhou’s reforms really had. Why was this?

Dwyer has pointed out that even as late as the 1920’s, there was no real network of good quality roads providing a good quality trade network in and around Chengdu. Internal communications, he further points out, simply meant interior cities took far longer to develop like those on the coast or Treaty Ports. Dwyer further cites a 1931 visitor to Chengdu who notes that it was 25-40 years behind Chongqing in ‘material conveniences’.⁸  Dwyer adds that Chengdu in the 1920’s was still ‘pre-industrial – indeed virtually medieval’.⁹  One huge limitation on Chengdu’s ability to urbanise in the same way as treaty ports was simply access to foreign money and trade. Not only this, but ideas of how to plan cities was, in many cases, imported directly from the foreign settlers themselves. Although one must carefully note these were often as part of colonial and expansionist projects, many Asian cities have since expanded upon and made the most of the layouts and spatial divisions crafted by international settlers. The Shanghai Bund, still prominent and indeed a main attraction, was initially a space which flourished as part of the greater International Settlement.

To conclude, Stapleton’s article is useful in revealing the context of Chengdu’s changes in the late Qing period. By highlighting the role of Zhou Shanpei, she singles out an individual figure that made a big impact on the city in the light of the ‘New Policies’. However, in comparison to other contemporary Chinese cities, Chengdu appears to be relatively behind and indeed urbanism did not take hold nearly as quickly as it did outwith China’s interior.

1. D. J. Dwyer, “Chengdu, Sichuan: The Modernisation of a Chinese City”, Geography 71, no. 3 (1986), pp. 216 [↩]
2. Kristin Stapleton, Civilizing Chengdu: Chinese Urban Reform, 1895–1937, 1st ed., 186, (Harvard, 2000) [↩]
3. Stapleton, Civilizing Chengdu, p. 2 [↩]
4. Ibid, p. 49 [↩]
5. Ibid, p. 74 [↩]
6. Ibid [↩]
7. Ibid, p. 75 [↩]
8. Dwyer, ‘Chengdu, Sichuan’, p. 216 [↩]
9. Ibid, p. 219 [↩]

This blog post focuses on a diagram from Ebenezer Howard’s book, ‘To-morrow: A Peaceful Path to Real Reform’. In this book Howard set out his vision for the Garden City, a form of settlement designed to combat the overcrowding, disease, and squalor in cities, but also to provide job opportunities and social life not seen in rural England.

 

This particular diagram shows Howard’s wider vision, where a central garden city was surrounded by smaller satellite cities, connected by a system of roads, railways, and canals. In addition, the two developments set aside for allotments would help provide for the overall city, in combination with farms situated between municipalities. The overall effect of the diagram was to set out a planned community which could sustain its population with both food and employment, while also remaining self-sufficient with its welfare programs. This differentiated it from later projects like the 1950s New Towns, which were orchestrated by centralised government.
The diagram also helps shed light on contemporary views surrounding urban social problems and providing care for people with illnesses considered uncurable. The diagram clearly shows that homes for orphans and alcoholics would be situated outside the city proper, alongside an insane asylum. This highlights the arms-length approach people held towards these issues at the turn of the century: even when sympathetic to reducing these social problems, the first impulse was to remove them from the more populated cities. However, this could also fit with ideas of rural air being beneficial to health. In this way, Howard’s plan would seek to utilise the benefits of the countryside while keeping able-bodied orphans and recovering alcoholics close to job opportunities and places of education.
Above all, this diagram is clearly only theoretical. The actual layout of the city is not shown, and the locations of the surrounding services are approximate at best. There is also no mention of the landscape the perfectly straight roads and perfectly flat canals would have to contend with. This was because of two reasons: the diagram is solely conceptual, but also there were no examples of such a city to work with at the time Howard published his book. In reality, the Garden City would struggle to grow due to a lack of funds, while existing roads and railways would limit the symmetry and cohesiveness of the eventual settlements that grew using this plan.
Overall, the diagram is a useful tool to visualise Howard’s broader idea of a self-sufficient settlement combining the town and country. The model of the Garden City would utilise the space and health benefits of the countryside, while retaining a large variety of job opportunities which had caused the mass migration into cities during the nineteenth century. This fulfilled one of Howard’s most important ideas, the town-city: a combination of the best of both living environments. While no full Garden City was ever made, Howard’s design shows how urban planners at the start of the twentieth century were increasingly focused on solving social and economic problems through planned city design.

Sources
Hall, P. 1990. Cities of Tomorrow. Oxford: Blackwell. pp. 86-136.
Diagram – Hall, P. Cities of Tomorrow, p. 92.

This blog post will focus on investigating how the British colonial powers used urban planning, specifically wide and straight streets, as a form of social control and a way to impose colonial rule. Robert Home’s chapter ‘Planting is My Trade: The Shapers of Colonial Urban Landscapes’ in his book Of Planting and Planning the Making of British Colonial Cities explores how the wide, straight street was a way to impose colonial order upon indigenous culture.¹ Home emphasises how, in the 20^th century, there was a need to protect colonial cities across the empire against ‘encroachments’ and the British colonial powers saw the ‘straight street’ as a way of more easily detecting and preventing these ‘encroachments’.² It was such an embedded part of colonial urban planning that street widths were specified in regulations and main roads had a mandatory width of 30-45m.³ This practice of wide and straight streets is evident when examining the primary source of The Jackson Plan for Singapore.⁴ The plan includes almost exclusively straight streets dividing the city illustrating Jackson aimed to segregate each segment of society to prevent any ‘encroachment’ from banding together and threatening colonial rule. There are also clear divisions for each sector of society, such as the ‘European Town’ or the ‘Chinese Champong’, again allowing the colonial rulers complete control and surveillance of areas that could create resistance. The colonial rulers justified these significant divisions on public health grounds. However, this justification is dubious through examining the traditions of the indigenous population living in Singapore. The indigenous cultures that had lived in the tropics had always favoured narrow streets as they were better suited to the climate. As Home evidences, ‘The Spanish Law of the Indies stated that ‘in cold climates the streets shall be wide; in hot climates narrow’.⁵ This knowledge had previously enabled the indigenous population to live in Singapore successfully; thus the colonial powers choice to ignore this knowledge illustrates that their justification for the wide roads as a public health measure when tactic to disguise their overarching goal of social control.

In comparison, the same use of the straight and wide street can also be seen in the colonial cities of Bombay and Calcutta. In Bombay, the Bombay City Improvement Trust controlled development, made new streets, and opened out crowded areas. One of their key projects was the widening of Church Gate Street from 9 to 21 metres.((Robert K. Home, “Port Cities of the British Empire: A Global Thalassocracy,” in Of Planting and Planning: The Making of British Colonial Cities (New York: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2013), pp. 64-91, 84.)) They also built straight streets to divide the ‘White Bombay’ and ‘Indian Bombay’ as a way to prevent and deter any indigenous opposition.⁶ Next, in Calcutta, an improvement committee was assigned to ensure that ‘the streets and lanes […] should henceforth be constructed with order and system’.⁷ The image below shows the imperial capital, and evidences the wide streets that were erected throughout the city in an attempt to keep populations apart. The importance of the layout of these colonial cities and the emphasis on using the streets to ensure ‘order’ again highlights how the British colonial powers were using the city landscape to control the colonised people.

 

Overall, from observing the street layouts in the above maps and images from the colonial cities, Singapore, Bombay, and Calcutta, in the context of Home’s argument the role of the wide straight street becomes clear. It is evident this design was used across the empire as a way to control public space to separate and dismantle societies that could have threatened colonial power. Despite the widening of the streets going against indigenous knowledge of climate control and destroying indigenous spaces, the goal of colonial order and control took priority over resolving any of the hardships caused. 

 

1. Robert K. Home, “’Planting Is My Trade’: The Shapers of Colonial Urban Landscapes,” in Of Planting and Planning: The Making of British Colonial Cities ((New York: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2013), pp. 38-63, 61. [↩]
2. Ibid., 59. [↩]
3. Ibid. [↩]
4. Lieut Jackson, Survey Department Singapore, National Archives of Singapore (London, 1828). [↩]
5. Home, ‘Planting is my Trade’, 61. [↩]
6. Ibid., 68. [↩]
7. Ibid., 71. [↩]