All about parks

0:00Discussion keeps the world turning. This is Round Table. Everybody loves a park. It's a little oasis in the concrete jungle, a place to relax, recharge and reconnect with ourselves and the world around us. But keeping this green space is thriving takes more than planting trees and laying paths. Who pays for their upkeep? And how can cities keep parks accessible to everyone while making them financially sustainable? Coming to you from our studios in Beijing, this is Round Table. I'm Feifei for today's discussion. I'm joined by Yushan and Yushan. First, More than 210 million visits were recorded at Urban Parks across China during the National Day Holiday, from autumn scenery, nighttime light shows to cultural performances in outdoor leisure. Parks are becoming much more than places to walk or exercise.

1:03But behind their growing popularity lies a very practical question. Who are paying to keep these public spaces running and how can cities balance that commercial activities with public access? And then let's walk outside of our city areas. China is also building a national park system designed to protect some of the country's most important natural equal systems, mostly in the wilderness. What distinguishes national parks from our urban parks? And what will take to make conservation more effective in the years ahead? These are some very big questions. We're going trying at least to answer today with parks. Yushan and Yushan, so more than 210 million park visits during the National Day Holiday, which is about a week time. That's a lot. So how, why are parks attractive to our tourists?

2:05Well, as you mentioned before, it is just the best season for people to travel. To go to all of these parks, right? It is the cool season. It is the night. There's nice weather and there's holiday time for people to actually have time to get into these parks. And yeah, these parks are also doing a lot, putting a lot of emphasis on attracting people to get into these parks. So the Ministry of Housing and Urban Rule Development is also showing the data that these parks have helped drive over 5.2 billion yuan, or that's around $776 million in related consumer spending during the period. Which means that while people are not only visiting this park, they're also paying, buying things, consuming things, in or around these parks. Yeah, and that's something that 10, 20 years ago we don't really see it very often. Back then, going to the park is just one other way for families to hang out, for kids who cannot stay in door to lush those energy out somewhere in the park, between the trees, wanting off and the forest, stuff like that.

3:12But nowadays, parks are really working hard to attract visitors by just aligning itself with so many different aspects, for example, through special events. Because during the past holiday period, parks across China hosted a total of 11,000 special events, and that include flower shows, cultural performances, and hands-on experiences with traditional intangible cultural heritage. And that's all according to Ministry of Housing and Urban Rule Development too. And that's one side of things, while some other parks are also extending their entry hours so that visitors can experience more immersively. Like, for example, from the autumn scenery by daytime to the nighttime adventures, and will she actually, I think you should present this example. That's my long time. And that is the thing that these parks will do normally for almost every festival is in holidays. There are nighttime lantern shows and flower exhibitions in these kind of gardens, because every season has their specific flowers to bloom.

4:18So these parks, they are very well known for all of these, or different types of flowers for different seasons. And this one in Wuxi, it's called Maywen Park hosted an autumn lantern festival inspired by the classic of mountains and seas. That's also an old ancient Chinese painting, bringing that kind of myths of this ancient Chinese text to life in a city. And life in a century old southern Chinese style. Yeah, I really love those gardens coming from Jiangsu Province or Zhou Jian Province. We call that style in Chinese as Jiangnan, which have a very sophisticated design when it comes to the kinds of plants. Thank you for saying that. I really, yeah, it's something that I didn't know when I visited Suzhou that a lot of these palaces in Beijing actually borrow design. Yep, exactly. From gardens in Suzhou and Wuxi and other places in those regions.

5:19And I think this year, this time of the year is the Crescentum season. Yes. Right? That's where a lot of the flower shows are themed around. And another thing is that I think, comparing with the past, parks are just more enjoyable just staying outdoors. I visited the Olympic Forest Park in northern Beijing. It's just a very relaxing place where you just have to drag around. You can also do some rock climbing. There are also facilities for that. You can boating, high yanking. And they're just walking around the forest. It doesn't feel like a city anymore. And apparently a lot of parks in China are making the outdoor spaces more enjoyable so that when people are visiting these parks, it's not just for a walk or for a jog. You can do a lot, a lot of outdoor exercises and also leisure spores and even entertainment in that space.

6:21Yeah, because well, you mentioned Olympic Forest Park. The park was constructed with the purpose of incorporating a park's name, a park's seatalization with sports. But for a lot of other public parks, that's where they're heading as well. For example, in Chaozhou, in South China's Guangdong province, the Chao Ren Gong Yuan, Chao Ren Park has been developed into an all-in-one urban leisure destination. It has welcomed more than 240,000 visitors over the holiday. And I think nowadays, a lot of parks are also building with the purpose of social connection and photo-worthy check-in spots. For example, there's one that I read about from ChinaNationalRadio.com where they specifically reported about one country park called Chang Kong in Uguishan, in the city of Zhongshan in Southern China's Guangdong province, where a 7.15 kilometer forest trail winds through lush,

7:22woodlands and waterfalls, and the park arranges for distinct routes that offer different experiences. It takes its visitors just going through scenic reservoirs and following streams and cascading waterfalls. It's almost like, you know, the Taoism Heaven, where you see the water floating from the clouds, stuff like that's something they were trying to build. But since this beginning trial operation in late 2025, that specific park has become a popular tourist check-in spot and a trending destination for hiking, and it has welcomed a total of 300,000 visitors. Also, it is one of the 63 country parks and mountain parks that's established by Guangdong province across its all-20 perfectual-level cities inside the province in recent years. So we can see that this is a very vibrant example of how parks are being developed and restored into this really immersive experience for whoever wants to go and stop by.

8:25Exactly. These kind of natural resources, sceneries and environment is one of the things that attracting a lot of people to get into these parks for their leisure time and entertainment. As we were mentioning entertainment, you know, the ways that these parks are designing to attract people by their entertainment methods is also very diversified. Not only these kind of natural sceneries, they're also incorporating with IP-themed amusement parks. I think there is one in Beijing, the Taya Park. Yes, it's integrated with the world-beloved pop-marts, the Abu-Buh park, the park. Yeah, always run to the... went there. Really? Yeah. And also along with some other live music shows, immersive cultural exhibitions, these parks are integrating with some very contemporary kind of design with their natural sceneries. And then that becomes a very family-friendly interactive experience because while the time is for a lot of their, you know, reunions or, you know, a child-parent time.

9:35Yeah, speaking of Taya Park, my mom lived very close to that park. So that Taya Park, for us, sounds like a neighborhood park. So it's not some place I would go to on a holiday for a special reason. But during the National Day... I mean, it's not the luxury of going to that day. Yeah, but during the National holiday, I read online that they're hosting like a live music show, like, I think three musicians standing in the middle of their lake and play some a little bit of jazz music. Wow. I think in the dollars time or in the afternoon or at night time, it depends on when they decide to stage those performances. And that becomes one of the reasons for us to think, yeah, you're not bad to visit the Chow Yun Park during the holiday season to see the live performances. And also, you know, along that lake area and also to that Leona River, you can take on a boat, enjoy the night scenes, the light shows, which is also kind of the family interaction that we can enjoy.

10:38And also during the National Day holiday, there are also a lot of specialty food, beverage, markets, coffee markets, you name it, book markets, different, the under different themes in different parks. I think in the Olympic Forest Park, I visited the Holst or Carbon Hydrate Festival, which basically is all around the staple food, like pancakes, like... Yeah, yeah, burgers. There's very delicious and another reason for people to visit. But beside of their popularity and all the different fun activities people can enjoy, it is also for some city governments. They're finding it's more challenging on some level to maintain these green spaces, because we are also seeing they're doing a lot to increase and improve the environment, the natural sceneries. We've seen the flower arrangement in a lot of Beijing parks. This day is very beautiful, but that means they need to put in a lot of efforts and resources into that.

11:42So it is becoming harder and harder for them to maintain these parks well enough to meet the residents' current demand. And what exactly are they facing at the moment? Yeah, like it's something that's invisible to tourists, but so massive to the parks themselves, because you mentioned how like, cafe fairs and food being and retail vendors being offered inside those parks. People shop, people eat, and there will be garbage. There will be the lawn or flower arrangements that needs to be collected back, that lounds needing to be watered, prune, sanitation around that area, and also security, of course. So that's all a massive mayor called it burden to many of the parks, because China's urban green space nowadays has expanded to over 25 billion square meters. And maintaining this whole space requires approximately 10 yuan or about 1.5 US dollars per square meter annually for basic upkeeping, like all that I've mentioned so far.

12:54And that's totaling around 250 billion yuan or roughly 33 billion US dollars per year. Nationality, we're talking about a huge spending. And think about the parks we just mentioned before, Chow Yun Park, Olympic Forest Park, they are all free for entry, which means that they need to figure out a way to actually call it even when it comes to the maintenance fee and cost for running the whole park and make it clean for everybody who visiting it. But then what can they do? Like most of the parks we talked about are public parks, and they can't be like suddenly charged people, a large ticket fees, all of the sudden for engines. Then what measures have they been taken, the city's been taken to help sustain better and more built for larger urban parks? There's one very interesting development loop that has been widely adopted here in China, especially during rapid urbanization, is something that sounds like building parks first to raise nearby land values, then sell these parks around it land for other commercial or residential purposes.

14:06And this has been the mentality behind all that, and that's funding urban growth and also making these parks more valuable and more worth expanding in a lot of the cities. But now that China's urbanization rate has passed 67%, cities have entered a quote-unquote stock era, which is a stage of urban development where cities focus on managing and updating existing spaces rather than expanding outward on new land. So given this whole context right here, as land sales slow, parks have shifted from being revenue drivers into ongoing financial burdens because it's really hard to decide who is responsible for these parks after the nearby regions are well developed. The cost inside the value-al-side mismatch is still existing, parks incur 100% of operational and maintenance expenses internally, including the lighting, the trash removal, the repairs and the security.

15:07But the economy value parks create for its nearby regions for its surrounding buildings, such as increased surrounding commercial foot traffic and higher property values. These all don't come back to the park's profit. Yeah, and that's how all of these, I think, fairs and festivals comes into the conversation. That is the way I think a lot of these parks are doing, while of course the natural scenery is the one that these parks are offering for free. But they can also use these places and scenery to attract people and get into their parks and for these book fairs and they can charge for the place for using. And then the revenue can be used for the maintenance of the whole park and maybe for the whole region. Yeah, and also thinking about a lot of the more and more cafes we start to see in these parks. I think when we were growing up 10, 20, 30 years ago, not dumping on the exact numbers here, but we don't see a lot of coffee shops or book shops or any commercial activities inside the park,

16:21apart from some vendors selling some popsicles or 102 selling toys, but they're very small and very small vendors. But we're now seeing large bookstores, large coffee shops and even like I mentioned, the Olympia Forest Park, they have a climbing rock climbing facility inside that, which is also a commercial one. This is not a public one. So I think on some level we are seeing that they are, these parks are turning into location tailored strategies when they are talking about their operation. Meaning one park, for example, maybe Olympic Forest Park, they have bigger space so that they can start thinking about branding themselves as one of the best drugging parks in the country for all the other leisure sports like rock climbing. But when it comes to a smaller park, maybe it's not their strategy. It won't fit into their branding position to build the same strategy.

17:25So we're seeing this kind of trying to recognize what kind of strategy fits into this particular park, isn't it? We're trying to matching that into one park, one strategy so that one size fits all approach doesn't really work in all parks. Yeah, a lot of these parks are realizing that one size fits all approach fails. And then these kind of cities or municipalities are tailoring park operations based on whether this park sits in the urban core, the suburbs or newly developed district. So some of the downtown parks they are evolving into like all age hubs, they are tearing down the walls welcoming everybody is getting to the park. That serve office workers on lunch breaks, youth looking for trendy photos, families with children and seniors taking photos for birds. So it is kind of, you know, they are also using the strategy of making it more welcoming based on that kind of nature of the whole park.

18:30And then in some other parks like suburban areas parks, they're converting former industrial zones or old infrastructure into testing grounds or cyberpunk style of parks like the one that just really next next to us, the show gone park. So these places can be the testing grounds for new tech like drone deliveries, autonomous driving or sightseeing vehicles because they are kind of, you know, designated areas for a very new tech that can be really commercially pushed into the public. I think you should and I went to Shenzhen for a business trip together a few months ago. We visited one of the parks in Shenzhen where they have this drone delivery trials. Wow. You tried that. I tried it. It is really convenient. A lot of people are actually lining up for getting an order from that drone. It is still in that kind of trial phase or it's not try is actually in use, but it's just not that many of the stars of these drone pilots or something.

19:39So, but it is kind of offering you a concept of we can do that. And there is something that you can do enjoying the park while you can also get a delivery from a drone. So that kind of park it is kind of the main citizen park that is shared by the whole city. It's also in kind of a business district. Yeah. Also city center area. So that gives you an idea of it is integrating with the natural environment and with some concrete jungle buildings. Yes. It's called the talent park of Shenzhen. And I saw that on Xiaohengshu and other social media platforms that a lot of people are recommending you need to visit this park if you visit Shenzhen. I was like, why do I want to visit a park if I visit the city? Then I realized there are a lot of cool things you can do. And also that park is linked to another Bay Area Park as well by the ocean also cycled around that Bay Area. You can do a lot in Shenzhen.

20:40Yes. So you can do a lot even as a tourist. You can still enjoy their urban park. But speaking of, I want to turn to another kind of park which is the National Park. It shares the same name with the park park, the talent park, the Olympic Forest Park, we just mentioned. But there is also something very different when it comes to the National Park. Because China is building its own national park system which is a national strategy really. Then why do we need a national park outside of the cities? Because, well, we've mentioned parks but previously the definition of the parks that we've been talking about mainly refer to those for human. For human interaction and for encouraging more human interaction and foot traffic. But when it comes to national parks, not just us. It's for animal, wild animal habitat.

21:43And in fact, by 2018 China had protected about 18% of its land through a network of over 10,000 protected areas. And the problem was actually not a lack of protection. But how the protection was organized, like for example, there can be a fragmented habitat for wild animals. Especially the one that's loved by the whole world, speaking of panda, for example. Giant pandas, they lived in isolated small populations, cut off from each other by rows. And that's something that hasn't been attended previously. And also there are mines, there are hydropower stations and farmland. That's all kind of restricting the wild panda's natural movements and the areas that they're free to walk around and live in. So the isolated groups actually struggle to find mates. And their gene poorly shranked to a point that we have to intervene. So this is one, I think, major reason that now we have to come to this point where we establish this system of addressing this issue too.

22:49Because apart from the natural habitat for wild animals, there's also the fragmented management for a lot of the forestry, land, water and housing authorities. They each attend to their own sites. They often have a little bit of overlapping or if not, unclear responsibilities. But that hasn't been quite sorted out yet either. Speaking of giant pandas, I think I have this in conversation before with the next Bertondis. It's about in protecting giant pandas. Most people think of Sichuan, think of Cheng Zhu. They have a conservation center there. But when we're talking about wild pandas, they're living in this large area covering, I think, three to five different regions and provinces in China. So if we're talking about consolidating protecting wild pandas in the wilderness, in the past, we need to organize and coordinate among these different provincial level of governments. And then there is also the issue like Yushan mentioned when it comes to geography, when it comes to forestry, when it comes to water and also housing authorities need to be getting involved.

24:00And then there are also local residents. Then the departments looking over that need to get involved. It's very difficult to coordinate to the point if we're really seriously talking about protecting their habitat. Then establishing this National Park, they are the one that can be finally stepping out, saying that I'm the one that will look over these areas covering this several different provinces and regions and think about what we can do for each different places. And this is the coordination that I can start and I can initiate. And then other departments you can just cooperate with me and we can collaborate and then put forward and push together towards the promote the conservation of giant pandas of also different other species in different parts. We have like first a batch of five National Parks in China. Yeah, since they're official establishment in 2021, the first five National Parks in Sanjiang Yuan, Giant Panda, Northeast China, Tiger and leopard, high nontropical reinforced and Ueshian have made substantial progress in these kind of several areas because they are not covering only in wild animals but also natural resources, also geographical resources and also even plants, rare plants.

25:25So different areas of different National Parks, they're covering and collectively protecting approximately 230,000 square kilometers of land and they have integrated and optimized more than 112, 20 existing protected areas. And the assessments show that 75% of the indicators used to evaluate their ecological benefits were rated excellent and key ecosystem services including like water conservation, carbon sequestration and oxygen production have also improved. Substantial and also humans have a role in this National Park system as well. We're not only talking about closing off these areas and only animals and plants are allowed inside and moving everybody has been who has been living in these areas outside of the National Parks. So there are also a lot of local residents, there are also working in protection and management of this park areas for example, I think the number is about 50,000 local residents working in park protection and management for example in Sanjiang Yuan, for example on the Qinghai season plate, they can the local husband can work as a ranger, that guys, researchers or tourists around.

26:48Yeah, for like for example in Ui Shan, in Fujian province, a lot of the tea farmers also converting their own traditional tea farmers, tea gardens into more ecological tea planting methods so that we ecological tea is also quite a famous brand right now. And these are ways I think is also a place for us to look at how humans can co live and coexist with the nature with the world animals and with the wilderness. But since we're talking about the National Park system, what is the plan afterwards? What is the plan later? Well, China now we aim to basically establish the National Park system by 2035 and a spatial plan identifies 49 candidates areas that covers over 10% of China's land and that's actually more than 1.1 million square kilometers. And also the National Park law took effect on January the first 2026 so earlier this year with roles on planning, designation and protection and management and also public participation on how all of us literally all of us could take part in protecting the National Parks.

28:04The system is already helping the wild kind of the wilder wider network. So China's protected areas now cover about 90% of terrestrial ecosystem types and 74% of national protected wildlife and plant species are also covered. So that's a very good sign to start with but from the very common day to day people viewers site, San Zhang Yuan, giant panda protection, the Northwest Northeast Tiger and leopard protection, the high nontropical rainforest and we shouldn't have never been to either of them. So they are open, I think they're all open to visitors on some part partially not the whole of them. It's a whole resort but I think this is a good place to plan our next trip. Exactly, that's the purpose of all of these National Parks multi purpose National Parks is building up for not only the nature and also for the human. And most of these parks allow visitors to explore designated areas within their general control zones through maybe reservations and also approved routes and in some cases authorize to local guides as you mentioned before.

29:16So specifically, you know, restricting access to core conservation zones and the whole all of these things can be combined to meet the demand for of course, first of all conservation and then for educational and then for the livelihood and you know the local communities. Yeah, it's a pity we've never been to any of the national parks before. I do want to hear if our listeners have any experiences visiting one of the national parks or just share with us your favorite park in your neighborhood. You can send us an email or voice note to roundtablepodcast at qq.com.