Observing | forgotten old factory, how can it save you?

Wu Dan/Cartography

Original title: Industrial heritage under the new normal of the economy urgently needs to be regulated by legislation

Reporter | Ma Fucai

Responsible editor| Zhang Jingjing

The text is 2753 words in total, and it is expected to take 8 minutes to read▼

Old factory buildings, towering chimneys, rusty railroad tracks, mottled brick walls quietly tell the vicissitudes of time... Many of the old factories that witnessed the development of the times and industrial civilization have now become the industrial imprint or historical relics of the city, and have gradually fallen silent with the advancement of industrial upgrading and urbanization.

On December 14, 2021, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology announced the fifth batch of national industrial heritage list, requiring strengthening the protection and management of national industrial heritage, innovating and activating the use of methods, inheriting and promoting excellent industrial culture, and promoting coordinated development. Once an industrial heritage with a unique landscape, it is now faced with new requirements, changes and new problems brought about by urban development.

Where does industrial heritage go under the new economic normal?

Industrial heritage carries the memory of history

On Jiuxianqiao Road in Beijing's Chaoyang District, there is the famous 798 Art District.

The location of the 798 Art District is the "State-owned North China Radio Equipment Joint Factory" that began to be prepared in 1952 and began production in October 1957. At that time, the electronic components factory implemented three levels of joint plant, branch factory and workshop management, and there were 6 branches, of which the code of three branches was "798 Factory".

In 1961, Chen Yan (pseudonym), who had just turned 18, became a worker at the "798 Factory." Chen Yan told this reporter that he still remembers the shock when he first entered the "798 Factory": the factory building with a jagged roof made the workshop appear tall and empty, and the sunlight outside shone obliquely through the skylight, sprinkling on the huge machine, and the light in the workshop was bright and warm.

Chen Yan said that at that time, the "798 Factory" manufactured radio components such as loudspeakers, transformers, resistors, capacitors, etc., and its products were printed with the pattern of two connected circles, commonly known as double rings. Double-ring resistance, capacitors and output transformers were very popular in the 1950s and 1960s, and they can be seen in many older machines.

When the "state-owned North China Radio Equipment Joint Factory" was brilliant, there were tens of thousands of workers, but in the 1980s, the new technological revolution with electronic information technology as the core surged around the world, and the "798 Factory", which lost its innovative vitality, gradually declined due to the lack of response to market changes.

Beginning in 2002, due to low rents, artists from around Beijing and outside Beijing began to rent the warehouse of "Factory 798" as a temporary studio, and later, more and more artists began to gather here because they favored the "Bauhaus" industrial architectural style of "Factory 798", gradually forming an art community here.

Today, the 798 Art District, which is transformed by using the vacant factories and buildings of the "798 Factory" and is regarded as a successful case of the transformation of China's industrial parks, can be described as a model for the transformation of China's industrial heritage into an art district.

Chen Yan, who is 78 years old, still likes to go to the 798 Art District, which is full of artistic atmosphere. Chen Yan said that he didn't know anything about art, but he liked the atmosphere here, because in this factory area, he spent the best years of his life, and there are memories that linger in his life.

Congxiao (pseudonym), who opened a gallery in the 798 Art District, told our reporter that the historical traces left by the machinery such as pipes, valves, steel supports, and iron doors in the workshop are combined with alternative contemporary art works, so that fashion and nostalgia and other factors are integrated with each other and reflect each other, allowing him to see the historical footprints recorded by industrial production, architecture, aesthetics and other humanistic information, so he chose to open a gallery here.

Industrial heritage is often demolished in urban renewal

Transforming from a traditional industrial zone into a vibrant, even internationally influential cultural zone, Beijing's 798 Art District is a rare example of success, as more and more industrial heritage is treated as a land-occupying and resource-intensive asset in urban construction, and is ruthlessly demolished.

Such problems have been most common in recent years in some cities where traditional industries have struggled.

In this regard, Zhang Jing, associate professor of Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, told this reporter: "The main problem is the concept, due to the lack of overall planning and long-term vision, the decision-making level of some cities' construction and planning regards industrial heritage as industrial waste, they only see the value of the land under the factory, and do not see that the historical connotation value it carries far exceeds the land itself, so many industrial heritage with high value is demolished and rebuilt in urban renewal." ”

Located in the area of the Second Affiliated Hospital of Lanzhou Medical College, the "Former Site of The Gansu Manufacturing Bureau", founded in 1872, is a modern government-run military industry established to adapt to military operations in the northwest, which can be described as the initial bud of the Gansu national machine industry, which was quietly demolished in 2004; founded in 1905, the Chongqing Copper Yuan Bureau, of which the German Factory and the Ying Factory are the earliest modern machinery industrial enterprises established in Chongqing, producing copper dollars and silver dollars, which were later converted into bullet factories by The Sichuan warlords, which is the most complete preservation in Chongqing. The largest old industrial complex was demolished in 2005; the Chengdu Seamless Steel Pipe Factory, known as the "third-line factory" that opened the Chengdu industrial representative, had prepared a plan for reuse, but in the end it did not escape the fate of being demolished, and the plant equipment was completely dismantled within two weeks.

Industrial heritage is frequently demolished in urban renewal, and because the concept of industrial heritage is a new thing in China, it is also a new member of the family that has survived in history. It is precisely because of the "new" that a large amount of industrial heritage is not included in the scope of cultural heritage protection.

The protection of industrial heritage urgently needs to be regulated by legislation

So, with the acceleration of urbanization and the withdrawal of many industrial facilities that have fulfilled their missions from the stage of history, should the legacy left behind be demolished or protected? How to do a good job in urban development to integrate the old and the new? How to strike a balance between protection and development?

Industrial heritage has long been a neglected heritage category in China, until 2006, the first China Industrial Heritage Protection Forum was held in Wuxi, at which China's first programmatic document advocating the protection of industrial heritage was adopted, "Wuxi Proposal", and industrial heritage gradually began to be valued. In May of the same year, the State Administration of Cultural Heritage promulgated the Notice on Strengthening the Protection of Industrial Heritage, and industrial heritage was officially included in the scope of subsequent cultural relics census, no longer a "forgotten corner".

However, although many industrial heritages have high historical and technical value, they are not old enough to meet the standards of cultural relics protection, which also restricts the protection and reuse of industrial heritage.

In 2016, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and the Ministry of Finance issued the "Guiding Opinions on Promoting the Development of Industrial Culture", which clearly proposed to promote the protection and utilization of industrial heritage; in December 2017, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology announced the first list of national industrial heritage; on November 5, 2018, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued the "Interim Measures for the Administration of National Industrial Heritage", which clearly stipulates the protection and utilization of national industrial heritage and related management work.

Zhang Jing told this reporter that the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology manages China's industrial heritage because industrial heritage is different from general cultural relics, and many of the owners of industrial heritage are still enterprises in existence, and the corresponding enterprises are under the management of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. In addition, although industrial heritage also has cultural value and plays a role in cultural inheritance, the biggest difference between industrial heritage and cultural heritage is that it is relatively new, although it is also protected to a certain extent by laws and regulations such as the Law of the People's Republic of China on the Protection of Cultural Relics, but in the actual protection work, it faces various problems such as urban demolition, land ownership, and worker resettlement.

Zhang Jing said that although the Interim Measures for the Administration of National Industrial Heritage clearly stipulate the protection and utilization of national industrial heritage and related management from the aspects of identification procedures, protection management, utilization development, supervision and inspection, etc., the system of regulations and policies for the protection of industrial heritage is not yet perfect. In order for the protection of industrial heritage to be truly implemented, it is necessary to pass legislation to further strengthen the protection of industrial heritage nationwide.

Journalist's Note

The younger the "heritage", the faster it disappears, many people believe that these old factories and obsolete equipment should have withdrawn from the historical stage long ago, and even some residents of industrial heritage areas hope that demolition can improve their living environment.

The reporter combed through the more successful cases of industrial heritage protection and utilization in China and found that for the protection and comprehensive utilization of industrial heritage, there are museum models, cultural and artistic industrial zone models, tourism shopping models and public recreation space models, etc., all of which use industrial integration, knowledge dissemination, creative culture, leisure experience and other ways to explore industrial heritage, and seek development according to local conditions.

Industrial heritage is not only a cultural heritage, but also a memory heritage, but also an archival heritage. Today, China has entered a new era of new industrialization, as a young type of cultural heritage, it not only witnesses the unusual development process of China's modern industrialization, but also contains rich historical and cultural values, how to protect and use these industrial heritage under the new normal of the economy, obviously need to contribute to the wisdom and efforts of all parties.

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