New Pursuit of Zhongshan, the Hometown of Sun Yat-sen

By special correspondents LU CAIRONG & QIAO ZHENQI

Sun Yat-sen Memorial Hall.

ZHONGSHAN city is located by the Pearl River in Guangdong Province, an hour’s drive southeast of the provincial capital Guangzhou. Formerly known as Xiangshan, meaning “fragrant mountain,” it was renamed Zhongshan in the honor of founding father of the Republic of China Sun Yat-sen after he passed away in Beijing in 1925.

With beautiful street scenes and a human-friendly urban design, Zhongshan has won many national and international awards for its living environment, including the UN Habitat Scroll of Honor Award. The city is free of flyovers, and pedestrians use tunnels to get across the street, which allows for more green space without disrupting traffic. The average commute is only 18 minutes.