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The Three Front Gates of the Former City Walls
"nine inside, seven outside, four in the Imperial City"
is a phrase that’s been used by Beijing residents since the Ming
times. More explicitly, it means that there are four gates to the
Imperial City, seven gates to the Outer City and nine to the Inner
City. The Three Front Gates (Qiansanmen) refer to the central gates in
the southern wall of the Inner City: the principal Zhengyangmen, known
in the Yuan Dynasty as the Beautiful Main Gate (Lizhengmen); the
eastern Gate of Exalted Literature (Chongwenmen), known earlier as the
Gate of Civilization (Wenmingmen); and the western Gate of Universal
Prowess (Xuanwumen), known under the Yuan as the Allegiance Gate (Shunchengmen).
The sites of the three gates are now linked by the newly constructed
southern section of the Second Ring Road, which runs parallel to
Chang’ an Boulevard, from Dongbianmen (Eastern Informal) Gate and
Chongwenmen Gate and Xuanwumen Gate to Xibianmen (western Informal)
Gate in the west. This road was formerly called Nanchenggen (Southern
City Wall) Road. On the south side of this road, 38
apartment buildings, each over 12 stories high, have been built along
the base of the old city wall. The wall itself was dismantled in the
1950s. The Qiansanmen apartment blocks, with a total floor space of
350, 000 square meters, provide accommodation for an estimated 5,000
families or over 20,000 people. Among the other high–rise buildings
along this road are two public guest houses, the Quanjude Peking Duck
Restaurant and the offices of the Communist Youth League.
The buildings in this area were constructed by bonding interior walls
to prefabricated exterior walls, thereby providing a strong structure
and good protection against earthquakes. The use of the prefabricated
walls also reduced the need for intensive manual labor. Interior
designers made use of light – weight materials for interior
partitions, experimenting with a wide variety of decorative schemes.
Modern installations include elevators, light–weight plastic plumbing
and extensive waterproofing. The basic unit for each
apartment has two rooms with a floor space of about 55 square meters.
All are equipped with central heating, gas for cooking and running
water. The buildings are designed to withstand earthquakes measuring
up to 8 on the Richter scale and each block is equipped with fire
prevention and smoke dispersal equipment. Beautification
along this roadway has already begun. Chinese pines, lacebark pines,
cypresses and snow pines stand alongside persimmon trees and Chinese
ginkgoes. The flowering plants include peaches, weeping forsythias,
roses, roses of Sharon and crape myrtle. |
