After the incredible display at the Olympic Games last year it is hard to imagine Beijing as anything other than spectacular. Apparently things have gone down hill, though, for Beijing since the Olympics. Overseas Property Mall reports that with all the empty buildings now, Beijing has the feeling of a huge modern day ghost town.
Stories of Beijing being a ghost city are surfacing all over the Internet. They tell of a city which less than a year ago was prepped to bustle in anticipation of the Olympic Games and yet, a few months after it is all over the city looks deserted and half of the city center’s sky scrapers stand desolated and empty.
This is the story of Beijing, formerly glorified as the new "glitz town" of China and host to the Summer Olympic Games of 2008.
But fast forward less than one year and the outlook for the city is very gloomy indeed.
Take the example of a brand new baseball stadium that has just been demolished after opening last spring with an exhibition game between the Dodgers and the San Diego Padres. Those are sad stories that make us wonder what happened behind the scenes and why in the world big projects like these are being granted without checking their longevity.
Then there is the story of the million square feet of commercial real estate that sits EMPTY in the middle of the city before as mentioned . Just to give you an idea, 100 million square feet make up the better side of 14 years of commercial real estate supply in a good year.
Right now, the inner city of Beijing is home to a vast amount of eye catching and awe inspiring skyscrapers that are empty.
The question remains to what will happen to these buildings when no one pays rent? Plus as more and more corporations have to scale back their enterprises it is highly unlikely that this situation will change for the better real soon.
So what IS the Chinese government going to do with all these brand new, empty buildings? And where does this leave all the workers who are left on the streets, often without getting paid for their work since many developer simply went underground to avoid paying their wages?
We think we can all agree that the situation in Beijing is not a pretty one. In fact it is a very sad one. It makes one wonder how on earth it could ever get this bad.
Are our egos so big that we continue to build just for the sheer pressure of delivering better and bigger cities to host Olympic Games, giving no consideration to realistic demand and the environment?
You tell us.
This post can also be viewed on overseaspropertymall.com.
1 comment:
With the amount of people in Beijing it is hard to think of it as a "ghost town". I would imagine that in the near future those building will be full or used for other purposes.
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