Every time I hear American entrepreneurs warn that China will become the number one country in the world because of a lack of regulation which allows for unchecked growth, I remind myself that China is already first in one area: highest cancer rate on the planet. You certainly want nimble regulation, but you don’t want it to be entirely absent.

China has continued apace building its top-down insta-cities, throwing up towers at blinding speed, worrying about occupants later. From a recent CBC report by Adrienne Arsenault about the beautiful and barren Inner Mongolia metropolis of Ordos:

“Arriving at night in Ordos left us — here’s a shocker — in the dark. There was no problem with the electricity, but the skyline lacked the brightly lit high-rises that are the mark of a thriving city.

We drove down a snowy road from the gleaming and seemingly desolate Ordos airport in Inner Mongolia, along an empty highway past darkened building blocks and abandoned parking lots at vast malls.

We pulled into the hotel driveway at around 9 p.m. on a Saturday night. This is a city supposed to be able to house a million people. But stepping out of the car the only sound was the pinging of the crosswalk countdown timer across the road.

It actually echoed.

The hotel looked like something out of Las Vegas, and the reception when we arrived was oddly enthusiastic. The staff almost seemed surprised to see people wander through the door. It was as if they’d been all dressed up waiting for a very long time for someone to show up, and didn’t quite know what to do now that they had.

The lobby bar lights were quickly turned on and the piano started playing. By itself. There was no pianist in sight, just a computer program with a playlist that must have been set to’generic hotel lobby.’

Ghost cities, it seems, even have ghost pianists.

Daybreak shed an even stranger light on the city. Have you ever been in the computer simulation known as Second Life, where avatars fly around and through empty cities and buildings? Minus the flying part, Ordos is pretty much Second Life.

There are lovingly designed, but barren, museums and galleries. There are ambitious malls and wide boulevards, all largely deserted.“

___________________

The Ordos Museum is in a shockingly beautiful area whose development was overseen by Ai Weiwei: