China plans world's largest metropolis

The plan has been dubbed ‘Turn the Pearl River Delta Into One’, and will see nine cities combined into an urban area two times the size of Wales. The area is located on the Chinese mainland north of Hong Kong and Macau and includes the cities of Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Jiangmen, Huizhou, Dongguan, Huizhou, Zhongshan, Zhuhai and Zhaoqing. The area spans some 16,000 square miles and accounts almost 20% of China’s economy.

Once merged, the heavily industrious mega city will comprise an urban area more than 25 times the size of Greater London. "The idea is that when the cities are integrated, the residents can travel around freely and use the health care and other facilities in the different areas,“ said Ma Xiangming, the chief planner at the Guangdong Rural and Urban Planning Institute and a senior consultant on the project.

However, he said no name had been chosen for the area. ”It will not be like Greater London or Greater Tokyo because there is no one city at the heart of this megalopolis,“ he said. ”We cannot just name it after one of the existing cities.“

Source: MercoPress