The Skyline – Shenzhen Bay HQs
One of the most notable China’s urbanisation initiatives is the Guangzhou-Hong Kong-Macau-Shenzhen ‘Greater Bay Area’ in southern China, which covers the country’s most open and economically vibrant region. The area is home to some 68 million people and has a combined gross domestic product of about $1.5 trillion, roughly equivalent to that of Australia or South Korea.
The Shenzhen Bay Area central piece of 107 hectares has been approved as Shenzhen’s leading finance and technology headquarters. All infrastructural provisions for cars and trains are nearly completed, while most buildings, public spaces and pedestrian infrastructure have not been considered yet.
The Skyline masterplan is introducing new standards of connecting multileveled pedestrian infrastructure, combining city block courts with underground public transport and designated elevated pathways for pedestrian and cyclists only.
The multidirectional connectivity is happening horizontally and vertically. To avoid the disruptive nature of the fast traffic, the Skyline suggests nearly mathematical design system for the pedestrian flow; a diagonal stream of fast connections, which provide an uninterrupted and very efficient connective system, that creates a new character and public realm of the area. The diagonal shortcuts and multidirectional connections are more rational as they seem at first glance. In reality, they provide space and time-saving. Connections between urban block and buildings are maximised in walking proximities and minimized in material requirements, providing more porosity to the street level.
The injection of culture and green artery is extending the mixed-use character of the headquarters area. The extra pedestrian layer is inserted into the city to circulate the slow traffic and generate liveliness over the entire development. High–end commercial office buildings, cultural and conference centers, business apartments and hotels are directly connected with the elevated lines, creating distinctive commercial and recreational amenities. These ‘walks-in-the-sky’ are not only physical connectors; they are designed for a double use; it is an infrastructure and a facility for urban farming, dining, art pavilions, and walkways in the park.
The elevated footbridges are public corridors, designed as community drivers for business and residences. They are double used infrastructure, allowing quick and safe pedestrian passage, and at the same time offering places to rest and to meet.Central Park and coastal promenade are natural extensions of the Skyline. The north-south central park offers recreational and cultural services, and at the same time forms the main shopping street in the area. The coastal stretch is operating similarly; it hosts many cultural and hospitality amenities, which provide different character to the city during the week and over the weekend.The dual-use allow all public spaces to be commercialised and used for common purposes.
The Skyline connects directly with the sea area– the headquarters base is docking the Binhai Avenue underpass with public amenities, cultural programs and performing venues. The established metro lines, car routes and other 35% of the land area are occupied with the already assigned and running projects. The new structural plan is integrating these projects above the ground and allowing them to ‘get connected’ onto the Skyline network, which is creating diagonal shortcuts over most of the development area. The Skyline network is running at the height of eleven meters and twenty meters above the existing ground, connecting podiums via two pedestrian loops: the recreational green path and the cultural / art path. While joining the urban structure, it forms the social and also economical identity of the district.
