The Chinese consider the city of Hangzhou and its environs to be ‘heaven on Earth’. Located just a few hours from Shanghai, this tourism area par excellence has been caught up in a boom of activity, especially following China’s opening to Western tourists and the Chinese diaspora.

To keep the expansion of tourism in check, Hangzhou’s municipal authorities wanted to set up an urban management system that would include some tourist information databases (on museums, hotels, parks, mass transport, etc.), and digital maps. Such as system is known as an ‘urban geographic information system’ or U-GIS. Everything – the region’s economic boom, rapid changes, and relative flaws in the existing maps – pled in favour of using satellite imagery to guarantee access to accurate, up-to-date information.

Can they do it ?

The first aim was to check whether the very high spatial resolution satellite images that had recently become available could help update the city maps and databases. Their appli-cation to urban management in Hangzhou is a ‘case study’ in this respect, for Hangzhou is representative of the myriad towns around the world, especially in the developing coun-tries, that are caught in a whirlwind of changes and rapid growth. The project’s outcomes are thus likely to be used elsewhere.

Another aim of the project was to check whether Hangzhou’s growth as a tourist attraction could boost the local economy without damaging the environment. This means protecting the landscapes, managing waste disposal, etc. This is the condition of sustainable development. The U-GIS can indeed help to manage these many components comprehensively and effectively by including the concerns of the various players involved in development (planners, economists, tourists, etc.) in the overall scheme.

The capital of silk
Hangzhou is the capital of Zhejiang Province, in eastern China. It is located 180 km south –west of Shanghai and is bordered to the south by the Qiantang River.