The Pearl River Delta is a breeding ground for innovation, masterplans and megaprojects.  That was made even more clear at the 3rd UK Architecture Forum: Future Cities – Eco Urban Living, where sustainability was the focus at the forum.

With the West Kowloon Cultural District development underway in Hong Kong and Guangzhou’s ambitious 123-square kilometer Sino-Singaporean Knowledge City vision gaining steam, the eco-blueprints have green fingers with the Delta leading the drive to overhaul urban living.

“Hong Kong and Guangzhou have the base DNA to become the most sustainable cities on the face of the earth because they have all the raw ingredients already there,” said Colin Ward, Partner at Foster & Partners, who presented the West Kowloon masterplan to delegates at the eco-forum.

Speaking to The Nanfang, he described it as a “quantum leap” in terms of size and scope. “The sheer size of injecting that amount of culture into the mainstream artery of a city in one go is unprecedented.”

The big talking points of the conference were how current cities could adapt to newer and future eco-city models.  Delegates also saw the constructions and concepts that will shape cities in the future.

Other presentations showcased Changsha New Town in Hunan Province, when once completed will be a new city based on sustainability with ‘eco’ incorporated at the very heart of the design. Also, Sam Chow from ARUP presented the future of interconnected transportation designs while AECOM detailed its overhaul of the Olympic Park in East London, in time for the London Olympics.

One delegate told us that it was “too difficult” to ever incorporate sustainability into cities which is why new and complex green developments are spawning out of the pre-eco city ashes within the midst of metropolises.

Foster & Partners Colin Ward said “The West has definite pre-conceived ideas about high-density living whereas high-rise in Europe is low-rise in Asia.” He added it will be a challenge for Asia to come to grips with eco-adaptations, but added these cities are best placed to adopt eco-models.

Asked if new cities could become white elephants, AECOM’s Mark Blackwell responded: “I don’t necesarily think they’ll be white elephants. I think it’s very hard to compare new cities that are being developed to ones facing much more complex scenarios.

“Ultimately, when creating a very complex cityscape, perhaps in China, one needs to have the transportation, the engineering inputs, and the framework that actually goes in as well as an understanding of what’s going to happen in the future.”