Case library · Unofficial English translation · Glossary

How Chinese cities are reusing
inefficient land

Twenty-nine case studies from the 2026 national collection on revitalizing existing and inefficiently used land — from aerospace parks on old textile sites to a soy sauce brewery that bought out its neighbours. Each case is translated in full, with its location, key figures and the land and planning tools it used.

Cases
29
Provinces
19
Themes
6
Land covered
29 km²

Geographic spread

Where the cases are located

Province-level administrative boundaries come from the site's local China boundary dataset; points show the case cities.

Points mark the city of each case, not the exact site. The boundary geometry is loaded locally; no third-party basemap tiles are used.

Clear

Plan-led Area Coordination: Restructuring Space to Upgrade Industrial Parks

5 cases

Liangxi District, Wuxi, Jiangsu · 3,735 mu · 249 ha

Industrial Upgrading of the Yangming Aerospace Industrial Park, Wuxi

无锡市扬名空天产业园产业升级

A 3,735-mu traditional industrial cluster in central Wuxi was consolidated by the district government and rebuilt by a state-owned platform as an "industrial community" for commercial aerospace. Multi-storey "skyscraper factories" raised the park-wide floor area ratio from under 0.8 to over 2.5, while tax revenue per mu tripled.

Park-wide floor area ratio below 0.8 → above 2.5

Paojiang, Shaoxing Binhai New Area, Shaoxing, Zhejiang · 6,988 mu · 465.9 ha

Urban Renewal of "Shaoxin Valley", Shaoxing

绍兴市“绍芯谷”城市更新

Shaoxing relocated dozens of dyeing and chemical plants across county boundaries to dedicated industrial zones, then redeveloped the vacated 6,988-mu Mahai area as "Shaoxin Valley" for semiconductor-related industries. A menu of "four categories, ten methods" let each landowner choose self-redevelopment, joint development, buy-out or exit instead of blanket government acquisition.

Average floor area ratio after self-redevelopment below 1.0 → above 2.0

Gongshu District, Hangzhou, Zhejiang · 547 mu · 36.5 ha

Transformation of the Hangzhou Iron & Steel Banshan Base, Hangzhou

杭州市杭钢半山基地转型发展

After its steel lines closed in 2016, Hangzhou Iron & Steel Group redeveloped 547 mu of its retained land into a computing and data-centre cluster. Fragmented allocated and leased parcels were re-plotted and transferred back to the group by agreement under new planning conditions, ending what the case calls an "institutional freeze" on the land.

Floor area ratio, IT innovation centre 0.7 → 1.5

Jin'an District, Fuzhou, Fujian · 5,325 mu · 355 ha

Upgrading the Fuxing Economic Development Zone, Fuzhou

福州市福兴经济开发区提质增效

A 30-year-old development zone in central Fuzhou, 80% built out, revitalized 1,100 mu of inefficient land without new construction-land quotas. Tools included a parcel-by-parcel data base, property-for-property swaps for expropriated warehouse owners, tiered 20–50-year industrial land leases and a much faster approval process.

Industrial output per mu 3.67 → 4.73 CNY million

Weiyang District, Xi'an, Shaanxi · 19,605 mu · 1,307 ha

Urban Renewal of the Tuanjie Area, Weiyang District, Xi'an

西安市未央区团结片区城市更新

A 13-square-kilometre area of northern Xi'an with fragmented tenure — approved-but-unsupplied land, land awaiting recovery and urban-village plots — was renewed under a city-funded, district-implemented joint land reserve. A railway park was opened up to surrounding streets, and TOD development was planned around metro stations.

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