Beijing will spend 10 years promoting central axis’ charm, Shu Xiaofeng, head of Beijing Municipal Administration of Cultural Heritage, said in a live show during the “Two Sessions” of Beijing on January 24, 2018.
He revealed that this year the relocating and vacating work will begin at the major cultural relics surrounding the Forbidden City and repairing and preserving the city’s more than 3,000 cultural relics is still the highlight.
It is learned that formulating an action plan on improving the central axis to apply for World Heritage and a program on reusing vacated spaces have been included in the Beijing municipal government annual work report.
“The municipal Party committee and municipal government have always attached great importance to the preservation and World Heritage application of the axis. A special working group has been set up, planning to improve the axis’ historical appearances in 10 years and aiming to achieve the goal of being inscribed to the World Heritage List within the 10 years,” Shu said.
Shu expressed that the central axis is not only a splendid historical line stringing royal gardens like the Forbidden City and the Temple of Heaven in Beijing, but also a people’s livelihood line carrying the most representative Beijing culture with black-brick and grey-tile Siheyuans (courtyard houses) situated around the axis.
“The first thing we need to do for World Heritage application is to preserve the central axis. We will enhance the human cultural landscape and ecological environment around the central axis so that people will feel more comfortable to live there and tourists will feel more charm of Chinese civilization. We hope owing to the central axis’ application for World Heritage, more and more people can have a sense of gain and volunteer to take part in the preservation and publicity of the axis,” he said.
