Collaborative Parties

College of Architecture and Landscape, Peking University

Xi'an Urban Planning and Design Institute

Cooperation Background

To serve the nation's ecological civilisation development, treating cities and villages as ecosystems. By integrating regional characteristics of Xi'an and western China, this collaboration explores means to create harmonious, efficient, and green human habitats for the urban era. It addresses social, economic, cultural, planning, design, and technical dimensions, providing Xi'an and western regions with diverse pathways, methodologies, and technical references for achieving ecologically liveable cities. Concurrently, it offers academic insights and practical experience for China's development of new ecological cities and regional sustainable development.

Cooperation Content

Establishment of Teaching and Research Base. Peking University designates the Xi'an Urban Planning and Design Institute as its ‘Teaching and Research Base,’ formally inaugurating it as a long-term academic and research facility. This base will conduct research in territorial spatial planning, ecological restoration, landscape planning, public space landscape design, and ecological city studies to cultivate new generations of talent. Concurrently, the base will function as a think tank for Xi'an's urban-rural social development and ecological conservation.

Joint Research Projects. Both parties shall undertake one or more projects annually, focusing on territorial spatial planning, ecological restoration, sustainable planning and management of urban-rural water systems (sponge city construction), ecological infrastructure development, cultural heritage conservation, public space landscape design and landscape planning, alongside other mutually agreed topics. Peking University shall provide professional training and guidance to Xi'an Urban Planning and Design Institute personnel participating in research.

Duration of Cooperation

Five years (commencing 6 January 2021)

Distinctive Features

Based in Xi'an, a key central city in Western China, this initiative adheres to the principles of ‘looking to the future, responding to the times, leveraging complementary strengths, fostering multi-faceted collaboration, integrating academic research with practice, and uniting knowledge with action.’ It establishes a diversified industry-academia-research collaboration platform grounded in scholarship, centred on research, supported by production, driven by innovation, and guided by market demand. This initiative aims to create a model for university-local government collaborative innovation, supporting the development of ecologically liveable cities and regional sustainable development in Western China.