Skyscraper fever

Property developers reaching too high?

With the topping-out ceremony of the 632-meter-high Shanghai Tower earlier this month, the ranking of the highest skyscraper in China was changed once again. Scheduled to open in 2015, after a total of six years of construction the Shanghai Tower is the tallest skyscraper in the country and the second tallest in the world, after the 828-meter-high Burj Khalifa Tower in Dubai, according to the latest statistics by CTBUH (Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat), a US based company that is the standard setter for the height measurement of skyscrapers around the world.

However, who knows how long the building will hold on to the No.1 spot. With property developers' unrestrained enthusiasm for building taller and taller skyscrapers in domestic cities, especially second and third-tier cities, it seems that it won't be long before the Shanghai Tower is replaced by yet another giant skyscraper somewhere in China.

As major landmarks or even brand images for their cities, many skyscrapers in China have broken from their original function as high-end office buildings, and instead have fallen victim to the vanity and corruption of some local government officials, as well as the greed of property developers.

Touching the sky

Shanghai is one of three cities, the other two being Guangzhou and Hong Kong, that possess the highest number of skyscrapers in China. Home to seven super-high buildings over 300 meters in height and dozens over 200 meters, South China's Guangzhou is very proud of its CBD area which has the highest concentration of skyscrapers in the country.

A CTBUH report shows that over the past six consecutive years ending in 2013, China has built more skyscrapers every year than any other country. Additionally, out of the 20 tallest buildings in the world, 10 of them are in China. Among the top 100 tallest, 43 are in the country.

Race to the top

First-tier cities like Shanghai and Guangzhou are not alone in the country's current skyscraper race, second and third-tier cities are also contributing their all. In July, a groundbreaking ceremony was held in Changsha, Hunan Province, for the planned 838-meter-high skyscraper City of Heaven. At the time the property developer attracted a large amount of skepticism when it claimed the entire project would be completed in seven months. Not long after construction began, everything came to a screeching halt when it was discovered the project was not adhering to regulations.

A current project underway in Wuhan, Hubei Province, reflects the ambition to build the No.1 skyscraper in the country that many Chinese cities have. The Wuhan Greenland Center, which has been under construction for four years and is expected to be completed in 2017, has adjusted its planned height several times, going from an initial 600 meters to 606 meters, and now possibly 666 meters. An obvious attempt to beat out the Shanghai Tower and the still under construction Shenzhen Ping'an IFC, which is expected to reach 660 meters.

It's worth noting, however, that while Beijing is a first-tier city and the political center of the country, the capital hasn't seen too many newly built skyscrapers in recent years, with the China World Trade Center Tower 3 it's only actual skyscraper and two others under construction.

Development bubble?

In his paper Research Report on China's Skyscraper Building and Development Professor Li Yongkui from Tongji University, one of the country's best universities on architecture, pointed out that skyscraper construction in China is developing so rapidly that companies' experience in managing skyscrapers after they are built can't keep up.

"If we divide the life cycle of a skyscraper into the three phases of planning, building and management, what the entire country is emphasizing the most now is building, which is also what we are good at," said Li. "However, ignoring the planning and management phases is actually very dangerous."

Built to satisfy local governments' desire to sell land to boost their treasuries, as well as the short-sighted profit-first principles of property developers, many skyscrapers in second and third-tier cities have ended up as eternally delayed projects or vacant properties due to gross mismanagement.

The logic usually goes like this: First, local governments define an area as a central business district set aside for the construction of landmark skyscrapers. Then a larger residential area around this district is mapped out to attract developers, as this is the real area from which profit comes for developers. However, when the developer finally gets the land, they don't start by building the skyscraper, but residential houses instead.

Based on the promise of a future nearby business district, they sell these houses for a large profit, and then finally begin construction of the skyscraper. The problem is that if something goes wrong during these earlier phases, the plans for the skyscraper are usually doomed.

As for those completed skyscrapers, a lack of management experience as well as a supportive environment can lead them to become empty wastelands. Unlike common office buildings, skyscrapers naturally have more requirements for companies, which are usually business services, law firms and companies in the finance or high-tech industries.

According to a survey by international real estate consultative company CBRE, in Asia, only a small number of skyscrapers will be able to reach the ideal tenant pattern seen in places such as Manhattan in New York. "Skyscrapers completed or to be completed in second tier Chinese cities like Shenyang, Chongqing and Tianjin will inevitably trigger the risk of oversupply," said Chen Zhongwei, executive director of CBRE. "These cities are just regional centers, not the financial centers of the world or even the country, as such they can't attract large numbers of financial institutions."

According to Li, he once visited an over 40-story high skyscraper in a provincial capital city in the northeastern part of the country. From the outside the building looked tall and grand, but upon entering the building itself he saw that aside from some small property rental agencies and some training institutions, the rest of the building was completely vacant.

"Skyscrapers such like that have already sacrificed their quality and positioning in the high-end market, they have become ghost buildings only able to live off low-rent tenants," said Li.