Wachtel on the Arts

I have to say that I normally delete CBC Ideas podcasts that start with “Wachtel on the Arts”. It’s just not my thing. But this morning, I had to listen because it was call “The Beijing Building Boom”. The description from CBC is as follows:

Eleanor Wachtel returns from a trip to Beijing, where she witnessed the biggest contemporary building boom in the world. In the lead up to the 2008 Summer Olympic Games, Beijing is awash in construction cranes, as Chinese and foreign architects prepare the city for the influx of athletes and tourists. Architect Yung Ho Chang tells us what he thinks of foreign "starchitects" creating flashy buildings in China in the run-up to the Olympics.

Architect Yung Ho Chang talks about the importance of building at the human scale, and how that really isn’t happening right now in Beijing. He touches on the need for mixed-use neighborhoods and the need for a great public transit system. It was very interesting during the interview to hear that China is making the same mistakes that we have already made: gated-community, massive highway projects, and even mass-scale “urban renewal” aka slum clearing. Anyway, this show is will worth the time to listen as it also covers politics and our perceived notions of freedom.

Right click to Download Wachtel on the Arts - The Beijing Building Boom