Shanghai Street View: Park Play
This week we travel from the streets of Shanghai to some of our city’s many parks, which are getting a little friendlier by extending their opening hours during the summer. The move isn’t particularly new and comes every year, but still reminds me each time how different Chinese parks are from the big, open spaces that most westerners enjoy in North America and Europe with mostly unlimited access.
This outdoor story did see one additional new wrinkle here in China last week, when the massive Zhongshan Park in Changning District become the latest in the city to stay open 24 hours. That broke with the earlier practice for nearly all parks in China of closing during the night, supposedly for safety reasons.
More broadly speaking, the parks debate spotlights the big difference in China and the west involving access to what are usually considered public spaces. In the west, such spaces, which also include open areas in residential districts, are seldom fenced and people can come and go as they please. By comparison, fencing seems to be the norm here in Shanghai and China in general, not only for parks but also for most of the big residential compounds throughout the city known as xiaoqu.
The fencing issue involving xiaoqu was actually in the news earlier this year, when Beijing called for a broader elimination of walls around big residential and commercial complexes that impeded traffic flows in big cities like Shanghai. Not surprisingly, some residents responded that such walls were necessary to control access to their compounds and keep out strangers and potential criminals.
Some might argue that this kind of access limitation has a long history in China, and the Great Wall reflects such a “fenced-in” mentality from a very early time. But in the modern age, this kind of access limitation using such a wide array of fences and other barriers seems a bit outdated, and the next step should be a permanent dismantling of the many of the outdoor walls throughout our city.
The extension of park hours has become a rite of summer in recent years, and this year saw that trend continue as seven parks in Huangpu District pushed back their closing times to 9 p.m. from the previous 5 or 6 p.m. But unlike the past, the seven parks, including the popular People’s Park in the downtown area, will retain their extended hours indefinitely and won’t go back to the shorter hours in the fall.
Open Around the Clock
At the same time, Zhongshan Park’s decision means Shanghai is now home to 4 major parks that are open around the clock. Zhongshan Park joined, Guangchang, Nanyuan Binjiang and Yanfu parks, all in Huangpu District, which took the revolutionary step of opening 24 hours back in May.
City officials have been quick to note that safety was one of their biggest concerns for the previous policy of closing all parks at night. To address that issue, they’ve installed more comprehensive lighting and surveillance systems, and boosted the number of patrols at the parks that are now open after dark to make sure they’re safe.
More broadly speaking I applaud Shanghai for being a trend setter in this drive to provide greater access to our parks. Such parks in China have always had a bigger role than in the west, since they often act as social meeting points in addition to being outdoor spaces where individuals can relax. Anyone who uses parks here and throughout China will always notice the big volumes of people who come to sing, dance and conduct other musical performances outdoors, and also to play games like chess.
Such performances create lively environments, and are frequently in the news when they result in clashes between groups of performers and complaints about excessive noise from nearby residents. Personally speaking, I probably fall into the group that finds the excessive noise a bit irritating, and suspect this extension of park hours could boost the number of such complaints if such performances aren’t restricted during the extended hours.
All of that brings us back to the bigger topic of what these extended hours mean, and what might come next. The opening of 4 parks around the clock and permanent extension of opening hours at the 7 others certainly seem to show that Shanghai is determined to make our parks more accessible to the millions of local residents looking for a place to relax outdoors.
The next step in that campaign should really include a dismantling of the walls around some of those parks. The most natural candidates would be the 24-hour parks, since there’s really no need for walls if the park is never closed. Such an open environment in both parks and also larger compounds would signal that Shanghai itself is an open city where everyone is welcome, and people can come and go as they please as long as they behave appropriately.
