City planners should try to eliminate environmental degradation and squandering of resources in urban construction, says an article in Nanfang Daily. An excerpt follows:

Since the late 1990s many cities in China have experienced marked improvements in infrastructure construction. In the modernization process, however, great waste has been caused due to irrational planning.

The extravagance has revealed itself in some common practices of urban construction. For example, some infrastructure facilities like pavements and road lamps are renewed far too frequently and sometimes at the expense of damage to adjacent buildings. The timing of construction projects is badly planned - road building is finished before underground cables and pipelines are laid. Luxurious villas and skyscrapers are built in underdeveloped cities where local residents cannot afford to buy homes or the business environment does not attract outside investors. In addition to material losses, the inconvenience caused to people's lives and the damage done to local cultural relics cannot be measured.

But why do these mistakes keep on happening?

First, urban planners seeking short-term achievements in order to further their careers introduce shortsighted projects that contribute little to a city's development.

Second, telecommunication network operators, cable television operators and central heating companies focus only on what they need, so they do not co-operate when laying underground cables and pipes.

Third, some small cities have the wrong idea about modernization, thinking it is good to have flashy buildings. As a result, their efforts to realize modernization do not look good.

In addition, some local officials who want to get "backhanders" in the urban construction boom should also be blamed.

So what's to be done? Professional and ordinary citizens' advice should be taken into account with construction plans, budget management should be adopted and a public bidding system introduced.