China's Largest Ghost City Is Now 90% Full - But There's A Twist

Would you believe me if I said that Ordos Kangbashi, “China’s largest ghost city,” is now almost completely full? Maybe you would cite the work from one of the long procession of photographers who went there to take pictures of empty buildings, or the myriad news reports which called the place a “modern ghost town,” or even my own article that was published just last week which claimed that the place is currently one-third full to present a very convincing counter-argument. But it is a fact, I was recently informed that Ordos Kangbashi is now roughly 90% occupied.

However, there is a twist.

Ordos is a prefecture level city of two million people. In China, prefecture level cities are usually broken up into smaller districts, counties, sub-cities, towns, and villages. Within the expanse of Ordos, Kangbashi sits on the border of Dongsheng district and Yijinhuoluo, which is part of a county-level division called Ejin Horo Banner. The new city, which began being constructed in 2004, now stretches unimpeded across the Wulanmulun River, which is the frontier between these two administrative areas. Kangbashi’s core downtown is on the north side of the river, while masses of housing complexes are on the south side. When looked at from the ground it all appears to be one contiguous urban area, and nobody would second guess that it was same place.

The streets of Ordos Kangbashi facing towards towers being built to the south of the Wulanmulun River. Image: Wade Shepard.

What makes Ordos Kangbashi even more mysterious than being a completely new city built out in the middle of the desert is the fact that the place is yet to be recognized as an administrative entity in its own right. Although this new city currently has a population approaching 100,000 people, in the view of Beijing it doesn’t exist. However, Kangbashi’s administration is attempting to change this by petitioning the capital for county-level city status, which, when granted, will formally put the place on the map.

The interesting thing is that Kangbashi’s application for official recognition conspicuously leaves out the area to the south of the Wulanmulun River. This, perhaps not coincidentally, happens to be where the majority of its empty housing is located. Essentially, by snipping off this area from Kangbashi proper, the place suddenly becomes almost completely inhabited, having just four or five under-occupied housing complexes. So much for that ghost city critique.

New apartments for Ordos government employees in the area to the south of the Wulanmulun River in early 2013. Image: Wade Shepard.

There is a fundamental difference between how China and the West define and utilize the term “city.” In China, “city” is more of an administrative term which is used to indicate that an expanse of land is under the auspices of a particular level of urban government. Under this construct, much of the land that falls under the authority of a municipality is actually urban in name only, and can often include large expanses of agricultural areas, mountains, forests, or deserts. This is how China can have “cities” the size of North Carolina. For example, Hulunbuir in Inner Mongolia is the largest municipal area in the world by size, being larger than New Zealand, but it is over 99% grasslands. This concept of what a city is means that contiguous urban areas can actually be divided between multiple distinct and separate governmental subsets.

While dividing Kangbashi up between two different administrative entities may seem like an easy way for the new area to dispel the ghost city critique and make it appear more successful than it may actually be — which may have been intentional – this isn’t completely the case. In order for a new city in China to be officially recognized, a certain set of qualifications need to be met. Namely, population, GDP, size, and facilities must be at a specified level. In order for Kangbashi’s bid for county-level city status to be successful, it would have to trim off some fat. In this case, this meant cutting off the under-inhabited area on the other side of the river.

However, it could be argued that this area in question was never really a part of Kangbashi in the first place. As the new city was never an official urban entity, where it actually begins and ends can be debated. When the area to the south of the river was initially being built in 2010 it was designed to become the southern area of Kangbashi, but, as is the case with nearly all of China’s large-scale urbanization endeavors, a lot can change between the time a new project is conceived and when it is actually finished.

Construction on the new area to the south of the Wulanmulun River in early 2013. Image: Wade Shepard.

This is intensified due to the organization structure of the Communist Party, which sees high-ranking officials cycled out of office roughly every five years. So what one official does with a certain project may be very different than what his predecessor initially intended. In China, it’s a given that when leaders change, plans change.

Although however the place is divided up, the view of this part of Ordos looks the same from the ground: a budding new urban area that’s trying hard to diversify its economy, create new opportunities, and bring in new businesses and more residents.

But this may mean that those of us in media need to update our narrative: Kangbashi is no longer the ghost city, Yijinhuoluo is.