From left: Colorful flowers bloom in Hefei. An elevated view of the Chaohu Lake basin, where the government has built 10 high-quality wetlands in its surrounding area.

Adhering to China's "Two Mountains Theory" — lucid waters and lush mountains are invaluable assets — a key concept that guides the country's sustainable agenda, Hefei city, capital of Anhui province, is revving up efforts to advance the construction of ecological civilization and stride toward the goal of consolidating its role as a national park city.

In recent years, Hefei has made remarkable achievements in the integrated governance of mountains, waters, forests, fields, lakes, grasses and sands with a thriving ecosystem.

Hefei regards the creation of a national park city as a booster to fulfill people's aspirations for a better life, a way to enhances the well-being of the people, to raise its overall competitiveness and to bolster the high-quality urban development.

Focusing on four major objectives: ecological livability, health and comfort, safety and resilience, and distinctive features, Hefei is consolidating its landscape and achievements while exploring new highlights of urban landscape construction in the new era.

Scientific planning

Hefei respects nature, geography and cultural characteristics and aims to create a regional green space system that highlights the city's characteristics.

In 1958, it adopted a fan-shaped planning structure that focused on sustainable growth in three regions: east, north and southwest. This approach inserted farmlands and green spaces into the city's urban development to help form a layout featuring ecological balance.

In 1979, Hefei proposed the urban planning pattern of "One Core, Three Wings, Fan Layout and Green Circles Surrounding the City".

In 2008, on the basis of inheriting the classic urban ring parks, Hefei completed the Hefei City Urban Green Space System Planning and constructed a green space system with the concepts of "leaning on mountains and rivers, surrounding in circles, inserting farmlands, and forming a pearl on a jade plate".

In 2011, due to administrative division adjustments, Hefei transitioned from the "ring parks era" to the "ring lakes era". To meet the new requirements of urban development, it gave full play to its geographical advantages and formulated a new green space system that sorted out various ecological elements.

It refined the structure of the green space system into "One Ridge, Six Veins, Five Canals Connecting Lakes and Many Waters Converging to Nest", which referred to the "ring parks and farmland insertion" model from the past, while also building a unique garden city landscape on a larger scale, with proximity to mountains and waters, circular surroundings, interconnected forests and harmonious urban lakes.

The plan is based on the fan-shaped form, combined with recent trends in Hefei's urban spatial development. It proposes three major green wedges: the water source green wedge, the lakeside green wedge and the Zipeng Mountain green wedge.

In terms of urban structure, the plan constructs high-quality ecological corridor spaces with the backbone of the Jianghuai Canal, the Shiwuli River, Outer Ring Expressway, the Nanfei River, the Huainan Railway as well as Banqiao River and Dianbu River, promoting the formation of a multicentered, clustered and connected layout.

Concerning the city center system, the plan draws inspiration from the concept of a park city, emphasizes park-plus development and builds on large-scale public facilities to meet the needs of residents.

Green endeavor

Over the past decade, Hefei has built approximately 120 million square meters of green space, including the construction or improvement of 375 parks.

It renovates parks according to local conditions, explores historical and cultural elements, launches multifunctional projects in the fields of sports, fitness and cultural inheritance, and upgrades park facilities. For example, Hefei has constructed Luogang Park and Garden Expo Park with high standards and renovated Xiaoyaojin Park, Tian'e Lake Park and Huachong Park. The city has also constructed community parks and pocket parks near residential areas, such as Shitai Road Park, Labor Park and Feihe River Smart Park.

At the same time, Hefei is coordinating the planning of urban greenways and embarked on the slowtravel transport network. Using the river and lake water system, parks, urban roads and high-voltage corridors as carriers, Hefei has launched key greenway projects along the Nanfei River and other areas, completing 573 kilometers of greenways.

Its slow-travel network mainly includes the construction of pedestrian and bicycle lanes and the improvement of the auxiliary road network of greenways, which will enhance the functionality, convenience and accessibility of urban greenways.

Currently, the green coverage area of Hefei is 232.83 square kilometers. The green space rate in the built-up area is 40.30 percent and the green coverage rate is 45.96 percent. The per capita park green space area is 14.92 sq m.

To date, Hefei has constructed 89 comprehensive parks, 192 community parks, 18 specialized parks and 231 amusement parks. The city's urban tree-lined road coverage rate is 86.3 percent. All these indicators meet the national park city standards.

Wetland restoration

Hefei has strengthened wetland protection and restoration and built 10 high-quality wetlands around Chaohu Lake. This has enhanced the adaptability of wetland ecosystems and vegetation to seasonal water level changes while enriching wetland biodiversity.

In July 2022, Hefei completed the restoration tasks for 10 major wetlands at Chaohu Lake, which have accumulated a flood storage capacity of 269 million cubic meters, significantly reducing the inflow of water into the lake, protecting the safety of the main urban area and enhancing the flood storage function.

The total area of wetland in the city is 118,200 hectares, with five national wetland parks and three provincial wetland parks.

Hefei invested a total of 5.85 billion yuan ($801 million), restoring and rehabilitating 4,335.5 hectares of wetlands, planting 410,000 trees and 33.54 million sq m of shrubs, and establishing 9.06 million sq m of aquatic vegetation.

Cultural preservation

Hefei has a history of more than 2,200 years. The Chaohu Lake basin, centered around Hefei, is one of the important birthplaces of Chinese civilization. Since the reform and opening-up, Hefei has developed distinctive cultural characteristics and its soft power has continued to form multifaceted features.

Hefei has continued to protect ancient gardens, attached great importance to the protection and development of cultural heritage, and regarded historical elements as key factors in urban landscape planning and construction.

Baogong Park, Xiaoyaojin Park and Three Kingdoms Heritage Park are included in the list of parks with historical value in Hefei. The city also integrates traditional culture and local folk customs into the design of its overall urban planning in an effort to preserve cultural legacies.

wangjinhui@chinadaily.com.cn