![]() ![]() Using data scraped from social media sites in Chengdu and Shenyang, the model was tested using 300 m x 300 m grid cells marking residential locations. Given the lack of openly available data in China, data was scraped from Chinese social media and websites, including Dianping (Chinese Yelp), Amap (Chinese Map Quest), Fang (Chinese Zillow), and Baidu (Chinese Google Maps) using openly accessible Application Programming Interfaces(APIs). The Civic Data Design Lab developed a model to identify Ghost Cities based on the idea that amenities (grocery stores, hair salons, restaurants, schools, retail, etc.) are the mark of a healthy community and the lack of amenities might indicate locations where no one lives. Even local planners may have a hard time acquiring it. Quantifying the extent and location of Ghost Cities is complicated by the fact that the Chinese government keeps a tight hold on data about sales and occupancy of buildings. Is a completely sold building where no one lives vacant? Locating and quantifying the extent of Ghost Cities is essential to understanding risk in the Chinese real estate market and knowing how to address the issue through planning and development strategies. At the same time, local planners often do not know if these areas are empty: the housing might have been completely sold but no one lives there, complicating the issue of what vacancy means. For economists, quantifying the Ghost Cities could be an indication of the extent to which the Chinese real estate market is overleveraged. MIT’s Civic Data Design Lab developed a model using data scraped from social media to create one of the first maps that identifies the locations of Chinese Ghost Cities.Įveryone, from economists to local Chinese urban planners, has sought to measure the extent of the Ghost Cities phenomenon. Little data exists which establishes the location and extent of these vacant areas in China. Ghost Cities highlight Chinese practices of overdevelopment and dependence on housing as an investment strategy, making the areas where they exist more susceptible to the effects of a widespread economic slowdown if China were to have one. The economic drivers that have generated this phenomenon are complex, but perhaps the most fundamental reason is that there is no demand to live in these areas – either because of a lack of jobs, schools, and city services or because of a general over-supply of housing stock. Often referred to as Ghost Cities, these vacant towns are not abandoned they were built, but no one ever moved in. MIT’s Civic Data Design Lab developed a model using data scraped from Chinese social media sites and Baidu (Chinese Google Maps) to create one of the first maps identifying the locations of Chinese Ghost Cities.Īfter 20 years of exponential growth, the pace of the Chinese real estate market is slowing down, and one of the signs are vacant neighborhoods and sometimes whole cities. Little data exists which establishes the location and extent of these Ghost Cities in China. Their existence is a physical manifestation of Chinese overdevelopment in real estate and the dependence on housing as an investment strategy. Ghost Cities are vacant neighborhoods and sometimes whole cities that were built but were never inhabited. ![]()
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