DELTA DESIGN FUTURES

The Pearl River Delta region has been severely engineered throughout its process of historical emergence. As it is about to confront a new wave of changes in the present century driven by economic growth, industrial activity, and growth of maritime operations, the book proposes “endurance” as a way of urban design in the Pearl River Delta region to organize space around the changing frontiers between territory inhabited by people and South China Sea. The book addresses the urgency to counter the risks posed to the delta city-region by proposing scenarios for urban growth. The design futures for the Pearl River Delta are formed by acknowledging the socio-political drift towards one direction above another, which influences the future organization or reorganization of space. The historical emergence of the river delta highlights the fact that it is conditioned to multiple directives and multiple transformations, which at the same time makes it exemplary yet idiosyncratic. Therefore, the scenarios of city-region development presented in the book, depict an integration of systems of flows, and the symbiosis of conflicting powers. A series of specific questions lead to principles that drive each future growth trajectory, which is represented through a series of diagrammatic logics in order to organize space through structures of landscape systems and those of new territories and networks.