Data helping to shape urban development

Planners using regular 'checkups' to identify ways to build better cities

As recently as 1990, just a quarter of Chinese lived in urban areas. But by the end of 2017, that had shot up to nearly 60 percent. It's the largest urbanization ever seen in history, requiring whole new cities built where there were once small villages.

To shape this expansion, urban planners are increasingly turning to data, to check that development is happening in the right way.