Absolutely Amazing

paulgaryotis · 10 months

My dad had a Chinese coworker that lived in the United States for about ten years. When he went back to China, he couldn't find his house. True story. He had a general idea but he didn't recognize anything around the area.

edit: Ninja edit

edit edit: Oh yeah, he eventually found his house.

theXarf · 10 months

And in 2027.

Buraktionman · 10 months

They made it a lot darker.

nooneastern · 10 months

this makes me want to play Sim City

TalkingBackAgain · 10 months

Some guy who got sent to prison in 1998 and came out this year went back home and said "What the fuck is this place?"

moneyeagle · 10 months

I was there 2 years ago. Amazing city!!! Never shopped or partied cheaper anywhere!!! I realy recommend it as a holiday spot

gamblekat · 10 months

This is what happens when you have an economy where 50% of GDP is based on the construction industry and a government with central control of financing pushing local administrators to develop at any cost. It looks great from the outside, but it creates huge problems in the long term.

A lot of the buildings and infrastructure China is building right now is drastically under-utilized - there are thousands of unoccupied apartments and empty high-speed rail lines that are priced far higher than the average Chinese person can afford. This stuff won't just sit there until China is wealthy enough to use it. Infrastructure depreciates. By the time prices drop and wealth increases to the point that people can utilize it, more money will have been sunk into financing and maintenance than will ever be recovered.

The situation in China right now is like a combination of 1980s Japan and 1920s America - vast industrial and infrastructural over-capacity, and an economy totally dependent on real-estate development. Brilliant as it looks from the outside right now, it isn't an organic situation at all. History shows that even countries (like 1920s America) that have the right preconditions for continued long-term growth will have to deal with severe corrections when they get into situations like this.

thielmann · 10 months

Amazing how they accomplished that in only 10 years.

WorkSucksiKnow2007 · 10 months

TIL that Shanghai loves the Bourne shell.

OpenShut · 10 months

My girlfriend is from Shanghai and grew up in the french quarter in the 80s. She never goes back cause the SH she grew up in doesn't exist anymore. Not even close.

abbbe91 · 10 months

They ruined a perfect park!

w1ll1amz · 10 months

I wish I was around to see the world in 2200 (if it's still here).

WilliamHTaft · 10 months

Suck it greenspace!

atxtonyc · 10 months

Did anyone else notice that the angle and scale of the before and after shots are different? If you focus on the large buildings in the foreground on the first picture, they're still there in the second (for example, the church steeple clocktower thing on the right is in the center of the after shot). It doesn't look like any part of the river has been reclaimed, either.

WaveOFsilence · 10 months

I'll see your Shanghai, and raise you one Dubai

Pookah · 10 months

FYI - the 2010 picture is at high noon... It's just the pollution causing the darkness.

jesticle · 10 months

And in 16 years...

easypeasy6 · 10 months

No clouds now just good ol smog.

surfacinglurker · 10 months

China knows how its done...

[deleted] · 10 months

It's nice to see all that green replaced by skyscrapers.

CafeSilver · 10 months

Reminds me of the then and now picture of Dubai.

johnford13 · 10 months

Meanwhile, in Detroit...

luxury_yacht · 10 months

Why does the photo from 1990 look like a drawing from 1900?

[deleted] · 10 months

This belongs in /r/cityporn.

scottylechien · 10 months

There was some really interesting building in the first picture (maybe historic) which no longer exist. I found that terrible, progress is right, but we should not forget past.

devoutchristian · 10 months

The tumor has grown and metastasized, not very nice for good ol' nature.

BuckFettman · 10 months

No other animal on Earth could do this. Maybe beavers. But not like this.

the_knuckledragger · 10 months

I was in Beijing in '89 and I remember bicycles far outnumbered cars in the street, street lanes accomodated for this. Now looking at Beijing I don't even recognize it.

bumbumboogie · 10 months

Since this picture was uploaded 12 hours ago, 6 new buildings have been completed

I_CAPE_RATS · 10 months

Your big box store dollars at work!

lightninhopkins · 10 months

It was much prettier in 1990. More parks.

ThirstForSavings · 10 months

I wanna pick up that building on the right by its handle.

ari-mulagu · 10 months

Rapid growth and modernization are not always good. The local ecosystem in the area has definitely taken a hit.

1984comment · 10 months

Any conformation, b/c I swear I have seen this set up before, but it said 1910 2010.

tresser · 10 months

Top posts in /r/pics named 'shanghai"

everycredit · 10 months

Too bad old Shanghai got...Shanghai'd.

Mororeflex · 10 months

There was an article I read a couple of years ago about half the steel being used Shanghai failed quality tests. I couldn't find that article, but did find this

Always a price to rapid expansion.

hoorayforblood · 10 months

yeah it's pretty easy to build a city when you have all of the western hemisphere's money and a billion slaves to put it together for you.

Geddingsworth · 10 months

My reaction: Holy shit... I was alive for both of these pictures... I'm 20 years old!

Retsoka · 10 months

Compare that to Dubai

lolmonger · 10 months

Totally sustainable and not all vulnerable to speculative foreign investment variability, right? ?

2LabsGuy · 10 months

Yet it takes us over 10 years to rebuild 2 skyscrapers...

SenorCardgage · 10 months

That's a real.....Shanghai Surprise.

[deleted] · 10 months

Everything changed in the matter of two decades. Thought-provoking indeed.

thewarpanda · 10 months

At the world expo in Shanghai, the SAIC-GM Pavilion had this crazy "Shanghai in 2030" video.

Here's the super ninja recording: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_vKAkdIDxjY&feature=related

Jump to around 3:35 for a city flyover.

EDIT: I did not record this.

MadMonk67 · 10 months

Looking more and more like a Bladerunner set.

non00b · 10 months

...and all it took to attain this fabulous wealth was the export of the world's manufacturing jobs to countless underpaid slave-wage earners from the impoverished chinese countryside who will never be able to afford to live in any of these buildings.

LeeHyori · 10 months

This is the beauty and power of capitalism. Yet, people reject it. It is the only way in which to bring the masses out of poverty. (For those who will say "Yeah, but the PRC is communist!" No, this happened in Shanghai precisely because of liberal economic reforms and because of its status as a "special economic zone.")

I find Hong Kong (Special administrative/economic region) even more impressive aesthetically. (It has been the most capitalist economy on the planet for a very long time): http://images.nationalgeographic.com/wpf/media-live/photos/000/128/cache/hong-kong-city_12846_600x450.jpg

funroll-loops · 10 months

Shanghai - 2010

FTFY

sirbruce · 10 months

Capitalism wins again!

scrochum · 10 months

is it bad of me to say i prefer the 1990 version? more green spaces, no soulless skyscrapers, the architecture looks more refined instead of, again, soulless skyscrapers.

dont get me wrong, i love skyscrapers, especially new york and hong kong, but when i go home (cork, ireland) its so refreshing to see sky when you look up, old buildings that just fit in except for the elysian which just got plonked down.

admiral_snugglebutt · 10 months

No more park... :(

NuclearWookie · 10 months

Capitalism: it works, bitches.

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