The latest list of super and mega cities has been expanded to 16: Hangzhou surpasses Nanjing, Jinan advances
Author: Lin Xiaozhao
There are currently 30 cities with a population of more than 3 million people, of which 6 are megacities with more than 10 million; the number of megacities between 5 million and 10 million has increased to 10, and Jinan has been promoted to a megacity.
Currently, central cities, especially megacities, have increasingly enhanced their ability to drive and lead regions.
According to the "2019 Urban Construction Statistical Yearbook" recently released by the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development (hereinafter referred to as the "Yearbook"), there are currently 30 cities with a population of more than 3 million in urban areas, of which 6 are megacities with more than 10 million; located between 5 million and 1,000 The number of mega-cities with a population of 10,000 yuan increased to 10, and Jinan was promoted to a mega-city; in addition, there were 14 major cities of type I between 3 million and 5 million.
List of 16 mega and mega cities
The urban permanent population of 10 million, 5 million, and 3 million are three important thresholds.
According to the “Notice on Adjusting the Criteria for City Size Classification” issued by the State Council in November 2014, cities with a permanent population of more than 1 million and less than 5 million are large cities, and those with a population of more than 3 million and less than 5 million are Type I large cities, with 1 million Cities with more than 3 million and less are Type II large cities; cities with 5 million and less than 10 million are megacities; and cities with 10 million and more are megacities.
It should be noted that the urban area refers to "the area under the jurisdiction of the residents committee and other areas to which the actual construction of the district and city government resident is connected to the municipal area and the city without districts."
The population size of the urban area is smaller than the total population size of the city, and it is also smaller than the population size of the municipal area. The rural areas in the municipal area are not included in the urban population statistics.
According to the yearbook, the urban population of six cities exceeds the 10 million mark, including the four municipalities directly under the Central Government and the two sub-provincial cities of Guangzhou and Shenzhen. Among them, Shanghai exceeds 20 million, and Beijing and Chongqing exceed 15 million.
However, Chongqing has 82,400 square kilometers, which is equivalent to the size of a medium-sized province. Some urban areas under its jurisdiction are far away from the main urban area. The current population of the main urban area of Chongqing is about 9 million.
Niu Fengrui, a researcher at the Urban Development and Environmental Research Center of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, analyzed to a reporter from China Business News that the current urban population statistics are based on administrative divisions.
For example, the urban population of Chongqing includes remote urban areas such as Wanzhou, and some urban areas are hundreds of kilometers away from the main urban area.
The main urban area of a city should be built-up areas that can be connected together. Although there may be some green belts in the middle, they should not be too far apart. If they are separated by thirty to fifty kilometers, they are not called green belts.
On the contrary, some places are actually connected together, but due to administrative divisions, they are not counted as one city.
For example, Niu Fengrui, Changsha City and Changsha County are already connected as a whole, but they are actually one city.
The 10 cities of Dongguan, Wuhan, Chengdu, Hangzhou, Nanjing, Zhengzhou, Xi'an, Jinan, Shenyang, and Qingdao have urban populations between 5 million and 10 million, which are mega cities.
Compared with the previous year, one more megacities, namely Jinan.
Jinan's promotion to a megacity has largely benefited from the adjustment of administrative divisions.
On December 26, 2018, the State Council formally approved the Shandong Province to adjust the administrative division of Laiwu City, Jinan City, revoke Laiwu City and place its jurisdiction under the jurisdiction of Jinan City.
Niu Fengrui said that Shandong has always been a "gemini" pattern. As an inland city, Jinan, the provincial capital, has no port and has certain disadvantages. However, Jinan is located in the geographic center of Shandong and has obvious advantages.
Looking to the future, Jinan will continue to grow bigger and stronger.
Shandong’s "14th Five-Year Plan" proposal proposes to implement the strategy of "Strong Provincial Capital", support Jinan to build a modern international metropolis of "Greater US Fortis", accelerate the construction of a national central city, and build a high-level starting area for the conversion of new and old kinetic energy. The province’s new and old kinetic energy is a way out, the construction of the Shandong Peninsula urban agglomeration should be a good guide, and the ecological protection and high-quality development of the Yellow River Basin will be a demonstration.
Hangzhou surpasses Nanjing
The Yangtze River Delta City Group is the largest city group in my country. After Shanghai, the leading city, who is the second largest city in the Yangtze River Delta?
The yearbook data shows that the population size of Hangzhou's urban area has surpassed Nanjing, becoming the second largest city in the Yangtze River Delta and even the entire East China Region.
Due to historical reasons, Hangzhou is indeed inferior to Nanjing in terms of urban infrastructure and resource agglomeration.
For example, Nanjing is one of the major centers of higher education in my country. The overall higher education strength is second only to Beijing and Shanghai, ranking third in the country, while Hangzhou has only one key university in Zhejiang University.
Due to multiple factors, the original city scale of Hangzhou is much smaller than that of Nanjing.
A reporter from China Business News found that in 1981, at the beginning of the reform and opening up, the urban population of Hangzhou was only 905,000, ranking 21st in the country, behind Qingdao, Jinan, Kunming, Anshan and other cities. It was 1.7 million, nearly twice that of Hangzhou.
However, after the reform and opening up, Hangzhou’s private economy has developed rapidly. Especially after entering the new century, Hangzhou’s information economy has taken the lead in the country and has developed into my country’s “e-commerce capital”. In terms of multiple indicators, Hangzhou has approached It even surpasses the first-tier city of Guangzhou and has a tendency to become the fifth first-tier city.
Driven by the digital economy, Hangzhou has a rapid influx of population and talents, and the urban population has expanded rapidly.
Data show that in 2019, the permanent population of Hangzhou increased from 9.806 million in 2018 to 10.36 million, an increase of 554,000. The annual increase exceeded Shenzhen and Guangzhou for the first time, ranking first in the country.
The recently announced "14th Five-Year Plan" of Hangzhou proposes to vigorously promote the construction of suburban new cities, accelerate the expansion of urban high-quality resources to suburban new cities, and guide the evacuation of urban core areas of excessively dense areas to suburban new cities and new urban inflows to suburbs. The agglomeration of new cities effectively curbs the disorderly spread of urban monomers, forming a clustered development form of "stars arching over the moon".
Sprint in second-tier cities
In addition to super-large and mega-cities, some Type I cities are also making every effort to expand and strengthen.
The yearbook data shows that by 2019, there will be 14 Type I cities with urban populations between 3 million and 5 million, namely Harbin, Changchun, Dalian, Hefei, Kunming, Taiyuan, Changsha, Suzhou, Nanning, Urumqi, Shijiazhuang, Xiamen, Ningbo, Fuzhou.
In addition, the urban population of Guiyang, Nanchang, Wuxi, Lanzhou, etc. is also close to the 3 million mark.
These second-tier cities are currently actively expanding and becoming stronger, accelerating into megacities and even megacities.
Take Fuzhou as an example. Its recently announced "14th Five-Year Plan" proposal proposes to accelerate the development of Mawei Langqi, Minhou Binjiang New Town, Luoyuanwan New Town, and Minqing Meixi New Town.
Coordinate and improve the reform of the household registration system and related supporting system reforms, attract the influx of people at different levels, improve the mechanism for promoting the urbanization of agricultural transfer population, and accelerate the formation of cities with tens of millions of people.
In December last year, the General Office of the Fuzhou Municipal People's Government issued the "Notice on Measures to Further Reduce the Conditions for Settlement and Increase the Size of the Population", proposing to fully liberalize the restrictions on settlement and achieve "zero threshold" for settlement.
Associate Professor Ding Changfa of the Department of Economics of Xiamen University analyzed to a reporter from China Business News that Fujian, where Fuzhou is located, lies between the two deltas of the Yangtze River Delta and the Pearl River Delta. Due to the lack of large cities, Fujian has faced increasing competitive pressure in attracting talents in recent years. Big.
Therefore, Fujian also needs a large city, especially a megacities, to lead the development of Fujian.
Hu Gang, president of the South China Urban Research Association and professor of Jinan University, analyzed to a reporter from China Business News that in the case of immature regional economic development, if the factors are scattered, there will be no competitiveness, so the provincial capital needs to be used to undertake high-end factors from outside the province. Landing, so that provincial capital cities will also radiate to the whole province, in line with the basic laws of economic development.
For example, Guizhou Province proposed to support Guiyang's expansion, strictly implement urban planning, improve urban management, promote the integrated development of Guiyang and Gui'an, and increase the primacy of the provincial capital.
Anhui’s "14th Five-Year Plan" proposes to make every effort to build a modern central city, support Hefei’s "five highlands and one demonstration" construction, and build Hefei Binhu New District from a high starting point, and develop towards a national central city.
Nanchang City has put forward the main objectives of the city’s economic and social development during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, including the comprehensive strength reaching a new level, the growth rate of main economic indicators, maintaining the national “first phalanx” of provincial capitals, and the position of economic aggregate in the national capital cities Move forward and so on.