2023 China Fellowship
Air Justice: A Study on the Relationship Between Urban Form, Social Class, and Air Quality

Many years ago, people thought it was unbelievable to hear that there could be a charge for water that would exist everywhere, but now everyone is used to it and takes it for granted. Just imagine that in a few years, if the air continues to be polluted, clean air, like tap water, will become a commodity that needs to be purchased with money, and will be placed on shelves or connected to the city’s pipe network system. The portfolio I provided—Made in Chongqing—draws this vision. The urban form of “Made in Chongqing” tower determines the division of social classes and the supply of clean air.

Based on this assumption, I would like to conduct research on the relationship between urban form, social class, and air quality.

For example, in recent years, some cities have gradually begun to pay attention to improving air quality by changing the physical form of the city, such as “ventilation corridors.” Will the setting of this kind of corridor increase the surrounding land price, and then choose the social class of the surrounding residents? In this way, we will see whether such ventilation corridors would only benefit higher-income residents, while low-income people will still have to live in areas with dirty air.

Another example is that urban scale is also an important part of urban form. Tokyo and Los Angeles are two well-known, large-scale metropolitan areas. They are both geographically adjacent to the sea, and their road networks are mainly grid-based. The reason for the difference in air quality between the two cities is a question of whether it is a more microscopic morphological difference or a difference in the main mode of transportation, and whether it influences social classes. These issues are worth studying.

This proposal selects three cities for research: Chongqing, Tokyo, and Copenhagen.

Chongqing is the site of my “Made in Chongqing” project, so this is where the research starts. Chongqing is known as a “mountain city,” where two rivers intersect between four mountain ranges. This geographical environment inevitably makes the city form very special, and the impact on air quality is two-sided. On the one hand, it naturally integrates into the city and breaks the continuous form of the city. On the other hand, it may be unfavorable to ventilation. As for which aspect has a greater impact, more in-depth research is needed.

The second city is Tokyo. As a representative example of high-density big cities, Tokyo’s air quality is relatively good, and it is a model worth learning from in the context of East Asian cities, especially in terms of public transportation and garbage disposal. By the way, “Made in Chongqing” is inspired by “Made in Tokyo” by Atelier Bow-Wow.

As for the third city, Copenhagen, its air quality is one of the bests in the world. In 2009, the Copenhagen Council passed the “Copenhagen Climate Plan,” proposing to achieve a 20% reduction in carbon emissions by 2015 compared to 2005. This task was completed in 2011, four years ahead of schedule. In 2012, the Council adopted the “Copenhagen 2025 Climate Plan,” to make plans for becoming the world’s first carbon-neutral capital by 2025. The plan proposes that global carbon emissions will further increase with the increase in demand for resources and raw materials, and effective sustainable development technologies and solutions are needed to provide support for green development. Copenhagen will take on the heavy responsibility and use the entire city as a green laboratory, finding smarter, greener paths to economic growth while reducing carbon emissions.

It is worth studying how its famous “finger” urban form affects its air quality. In addition, Copenhagen’s bicycle planning, rainwater planning, and other planning efforts are also worthy of research and study.

I am a patient with allergic rhinitis, and the allergen is dust mites, so the air quality is one aspect of a city that I am very concerned. I hope that through this investigation and research, I can find the relationship between urban form, social class, and air quality as it relates to urban planning, so that air, a vital element that belongs to none, benefits all.

References

Fang Yiqing and Qu Ling yan. “Study on the correlation between urban form and air quality,” Modern Urban Research, no. 8 (2018): 88–94.

Zhou Tao, Wang Di, and Li Fan. “The effect and mechanism of multi-scale urban forms on air quality,” Geographical Research, no. 7 (2022): 1883–1897.

Xie Siqi, Chen Xuegang, and Dong Yu. “Research progress on the influence of urban form on air quality in China,” Environmental Protection Science, 2023.02.24.

Zhou D, Lin Z, Liu L, et al. “Spatial-temporal characteristics of urban air pollution in 337 Chinese cities and their influencing factors,” Environmental Science and Pollution Research, no. 1 (2021): 36234–36258.

“I was born in a basin, a place that affects air circulation. Like many others in the basin, I suffer from allergic rhinitis due to the allergen of dust mites. When I have a runny nose and tears running down my face, I always hope there is a solution. The theme of the China Fellowship this year, “Shaping Our World Through Air,” gives me an opportunity to study this issue not from the perspective of meteorology or medicine, but from the perspective of urban planning, the major I am currently studying.”
—Bolun Qiu