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Buffer zone to protect Forbidden City
(Xinhua)
Updated: 2005-08-23 09:36
A new buffer zone created by the Beijing Municipal Government to protect the
Forbidden City in the heart of Beijing will also serve to protect remaining
hutongs and siheyuan (courtyard residences).
The buffer zone joins others designed to protect Beijing's most important
cultural sites, including the six sites on the UNESCO World Heritage List.
The World Heritage Committee of the United Nations Educational, Scientific
and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), in late July, endorsed Beijing's
heritage-site protection plan for the Forbidden City and areas to its north and
south during the committee's 29th meeting, which was held in Durban, South
Africa.
A Xinhua News Agency report said that the plan amounted to an attempt to
"balance" the economic expansion of Beijing with the protection of its cultural
heritage, a task "by no means insignificant for a city trying to develop into an
international metropolis" such as London, Paris or New York.
The Forbidden City, also known as the Palace Museum, would lie at the heart
of the new 1,463-hectare buffer zone. A vital part of the zone is the 86-hectare
Imperial City, in the immediate vicinity of the Forbidden City, where the
various ministries of imperial China were once based.
The buffer would extend from Zhengyangmen (the
South-Facing Gate) on its south to Di'anmen (the Gate of Earthly Peace) in the
north. It encompasses Tian'anmen Square along with the Square's eastern and
western flanks, and the area lying between the northern wall of the Forbidden
City and the northern Second Ring Road. The northern part of the buffer is home
to five sites of historic interest, including the Imperial City; the Directorate
of Education, which was the highest seat of learning in imperial China; and the
Shichahai Lake area, which is famous for its magnificent mansions and homes that
once belonged to princes, political leaders and famous Chinese intellectuals.
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