Urban planners eye China's cities

One project is master planning for Songjiang New City, an area rich in history and culture near Shanghai, which was being turned into a new city under the Shanghai government's One City, Nine Towns plan, passed by the Shanghai Planning Commission in 2001.

"Songjiang has been developed using the garden city concept, which originated from England," Harrison said. "But different from England, Songjiang has higher density, which needed to be taken into account in the master planning process.

"Songjiang also has many aspects of traditional heritage and culture which we have integrated into our overall design."

The garden city concept, first proposed by the UK's urban planner Ebenezer Howard in 1898, emphasizes self-contained communities allowing residents to live harmoniously with their surroundings.

In the city plan Harrison's team created, modern leisure and recreational features such as a golf course co-exist with traditional landscape in a coherent manner "through careful consideration", he said.

The traditional landscape features have been incorporated into tourism locations, whereas more modern facilities are mostly used by the city's residents in their everyday lives.

"The key thing is to respect the heritage, and not to destroy it, and also to integrate them with the needs of modern life, transport and facilities," Harrison said.

Another feature in Songjiang in which Atkins helped with the architectural, structural and civil engineering work is the Shimao Wonderland InterContinental hotel, being built on the site of a 90-meter-deep abandoned quarry.