Shanghai's 'burbs

Dates

2011 - 2012
Author

Philip Gostelow

Welcome to Shanghai’s ‘burbs where myriads live amid a boundless sea of high-rise condominiums, streets are coated in construction dust and omnipresent arterial expressways lead to yet more suburban sprawl.

These images represent a peak inside the suburbs of Shanghai. As China’s largest metropolis, it’s population bulging at 24 million, Shanghai is an emblem of the nation’s incredible economic miracle. Representative of contemporary China’s urbanism its vast suburbs are home to its workers, including the aspirational classes, those who having helped to achieve the country’s economic miracle.

With the world's population having surpassed 7 billion in 2011, one of its largest cities shows no signs of slowing its urban development. In Shanghai's eastern district of Pudong, an affluent middle-class housing estate is flanked by high density condominiums and the forboding sign of continuing development in the form of an as yet non-operational highway fly-over. Such is the city's unquenchable urban expansion, driven by consumer demands and politics, as its population hits an estimated 24 million inhabitants.

In Zhabei district, an elevated view showing a huge elevated expressway and circular interchange, pollution obscuring the distant suburbs.

shanghai suburbs - pudong district, near Jufeng lu, a middle aged couple with parasols walk across bridge over a canal from shopping district.

A woman walks her excited, keen pet dog across an intersection in suburbia, while road works are conducted, Changning district in western Shanghai

shanghai suburbs - a bus full of jovial primary school children on an overhead expressway.

shanghai suburbs - pudong district, a couple with their young daughter ride scooter on Jufeng Lu, passing by an older condo unit.

View of an old decaying but still occupied apartment complex, Putuo district Shanghai. set between new construction project and a backdrop of a new condominium estate.

Grandparents take their grandchild for a stroll, crossing a bridge, passing by a street vendor selling shoes, in Changning district.

shanghai suburbs - pudong district, school canteen at lunch time.

In Shanghai's eastern district of Pudong, a subway train heads on its journey to the outer suburbs where the rail line emerges above ground as it crosses an area of urban wasteland, with condominiums and industrial smoke stacks in the distance.

Shanghai suburbs - a city of 24 million, among the largest on the planet, the vast majority of its inhabitants living in the far flung aspirational suburbs. Here, in the city's northern suburbs, 4 young Chinese men walk under a pedestrian walkway aside an overhead expressway.

Shoppers walk by the facade of French department store Carrefour painted with mural depicting a Parisian scene, Putuo district.

View from a condominium in the Luwan district, looking out onto other condominiums. In Shanghai, approximately 90% of residents live in vertical residential buildings or gated apartment compounds.

In the distant region of Zhou Hai Road, in Shanghai's Pudong district, a subdivision of condominium fills an entire block, as adjacent sites lay empty, awaiting development, save for locals who are making use of the land in the meanwhile - taking opportunity to nurture small market gardens for growing their vegetables.

A streetside hairdresser, barber, has a cigarette and contemplates while awaiting customers, Putuo district. A minature decorative rifle on the wall behind him alongside a mirror the tools of his trade and a handwritten sign advertising his services.

Recyclers, a man and a woman, rest on the curb while taking a rest from their arduous ride, transporting reusable polystyrene containers, usually used in wet markets, in Changping district.

At dusk in the Changping district, youths on scooters await an opportunity to cross a busy intersection.

A woman selling lottery tickets from the street sits contemplating adjacent to a bridge over Suzhou Creek, a mural depicting a Parisian motif on the facade of a Carrefour department store behind her.

A cyclist crosses a main road in the rain, in Shanghai's Zhabei District.

At night, residents can be seen in an old condominium, which is due for demolition to make way for a larger condominium complex, in the Zhabei district.