{"id":1305,"date":"2023-04-21T16:49:25","date_gmt":"2023-04-21T16:49:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/?p=1305"},"modified":"2025-05-06T16:32:49","modified_gmt":"2025-05-06T16:32:49","slug":"ever-glorious-ever-ambitious-ever-grand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/ever-glorious-ever-ambitious-ever-grand\/","title":{"rendered":"Ever Glorious, Ever Ambitious, Ever Grand"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\"><div id=\"ez-toc-container\" class=\"ez-toc-v2_0_63 ez-toc-wrap-left counter-hierarchy ez-toc-counter ez-toc-grey ez-toc-container-direction\">\n<div class=\"ez-toc-title-container\">\n<p class=\"ez-toc-title \" >Table of Contents<\/p>\n<span class=\"ez-toc-title-toggle\"><a href=\"#\" class=\"ez-toc-pull-right ez-toc-btn ez-toc-btn-xs ez-toc-btn-default ez-toc-toggle\" aria-label=\"Toggle Table of Content\"><span class=\"ez-toc-js-icon-con\"><span class=\"\"><span class=\"eztoc-hide\" style=\"display:none;\">Toggle<\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-icon-toggle-span\"><svg style=\"fill: #999;color:#999\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" class=\"list-377408\" width=\"20px\" height=\"20px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" fill=\"none\"><path d=\"M6 6H4v2h2V6zm14 0H8v2h12V6zM4 11h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2zM4 16h2v2H4v-2zm16 0H8v2h12v-2z\" fill=\"currentColor\"><\/path><\/svg><svg style=\"fill: #999;color:#999\" class=\"arrow-unsorted-368013\" xmlns=\"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/2000\/svg\" width=\"10px\" height=\"10px\" viewBox=\"0 0 24 24\" version=\"1.2\" baseProfile=\"tiny\"><path d=\"M18.2 9.3l-6.2-6.3-6.2 6.3c-.2.2-.3.4-.3.7s.1.5.3.7c.2.2.4.3.7.3h11c.3 0 .5-.1.7-.3.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7zM5.8 14.7l6.2 6.3 6.2-6.3c.2-.2.3-.5.3-.7s-.1-.5-.3-.7c-.2-.2-.4-.3-.7-.3h-11c-.3 0-.5.1-.7.3-.2.2-.3.5-.3.7s.1.5.3.7z\"\/><\/svg><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<nav><ul class='ez-toc-list ez-toc-list-level-1 ' ><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-1'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-1\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/ever-glorious-ever-ambitious-ever-grand\/#The_Importance_of_Real_Estate\" title=\"The Importance of Real Estate\">The Importance of Real Estate<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-1'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-2\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/ever-glorious-ever-ambitious-ever-grand\/#The_Importance_of_Cultural_Tourism\" title=\"The Importance of Cultural Tourism\">The Importance of Cultural Tourism<\/a><ul class='ez-toc-list-level-2' ><li class='ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-3\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/ever-glorious-ever-ambitious-ever-grand\/#Enter_Theme_Parks\" title=\"Enter Theme Parks\">Enter Theme Parks<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-1'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-4\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/ever-glorious-ever-ambitious-ever-grand\/#Theme_Park_Frenzy\" title=\"Theme Park Frenzy\">Theme Park Frenzy<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-1'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-5\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/ever-glorious-ever-ambitious-ever-grand\/#Theme_Park_Frenzy_Part_II\" title=\"Theme Park Frenzy, Part II\">Theme Park Frenzy, Part II<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-1'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-6\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/ever-glorious-ever-ambitious-ever-grand\/#Evergrandes_Ambitions\" title=\"Evergrande\u2019s Ambitions\">Evergrande\u2019s Ambitions<\/a><ul class='ez-toc-list-level-2' ><li class='ez-toc-heading-level-2'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-7\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/ever-glorious-ever-ambitious-ever-grand\/#Operating_Realities\" title=\"Operating Realities\">Operating Realities<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-1'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-8\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/ever-glorious-ever-ambitious-ever-grand\/#Death_Throes\" title=\"Death Throes\">Death Throes<\/a><\/li><li class='ez-toc-page-1 ez-toc-heading-level-1'><a class=\"ez-toc-link ez-toc-heading-9\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/ever-glorious-ever-ambitious-ever-grand\/#Late_Blooming_Flower\" title=\"Late Blooming Flower\">Late Blooming Flower<\/a><\/li><\/ul><\/nav><\/div>\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">At its height, Evergrande Group was the largest real estate developer in the world, with contracted sales amounting to more than 700 billion RMB (~$100 billion) in 2020, and a billion square feet under construction at nearly 800 projects around China.\u00a0 Appropriately for its ambitions, Evergrande was <strong>also in the stages of building theme parks and tourism resorts<\/strong> on a scale larger than any that had ever existed.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">In 2020, the company was in the planning stages of more than $40 billion in theme parks and waterparks. As a point of reference, the Disney Shanghai Resort, the single costliest park to ever open, had cost less than $6 billion just a few years before.<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" title=\"Fairyland, art, fountain, fantasy, people, digital, castle, HD wallpaper\" src=\"https:\/\/w0.peakpx.com\/wallpaper\/14\/494\/HD-wallpaper-fairyland-art-fountain-fantasy-people-digital-castle.jpg\" alt=\"Fairyland, art, fountain, fantasy, people, digital, castle, HD wallpaper\" width=\"600\" \/>\r\n<figcaption><span style=\"font-size: 10px; font-family: Geologica;\">Concept art for Fairyland<\/span><\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Unfortunately, the group was overextended. As China shut down during the pandemic, all but turning off its real estate industry, Evergrande began to default on its nearly $300 billion in liabilities, earning it an entirely new distinction as the world&#8217;s most indebted real estate developer. The company de-listed its stock from the Hong Kong Exchange and entered a court-ordered, debt-restructuring process, and forced liquidations of its assets.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\"><strong>In Evergrande\u2019s story are the outlines of the Chinese real estate industry writ large, from breakneck growth, staggering ambitions, and a curious, little-understood emphasis on theme park development. <\/strong><\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">While Evergrande and its peers eventually came crashing back down to earth, what can&#8217;t be understated is their role in a real estate construction boom and theme park mania the likes of which had never been seen before.<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<h1 class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-heading\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"The_Importance_of_Real_Estate\"><\/span><strong>The Importance of Real Estate<\/strong><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h1>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">The story begins in the 1990s, when market reforms liberalized the housing market in China. Homes were sold on the market for the first time, rather than obtained through one&#8217;s place of employment.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Over the next decade, the right of property ownership was constitutionalized and formally legalized, and real estate quickly became the asset of choice for the Chinese population. The stock market was volatile, with the characteristics of a gambling machine. The country lacked a social safety net, and inflation quickly ate away at bank deposits.<\/span>\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1317\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/aerialdroneshanghai.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"450\" height=\"512\" \/><\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Homes, on the other hand, both appreciated in value and had the additional benefit of being actual domiciles to live in. They had a cultural importance too &#8211; having <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2011\/04\/15\/world\/asia\/15bachelors.html\">an apartment was looked upon as a prerequisite for a man to be eligible for marriage<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Annual volumes of land sales quadrupled between 2000 and 2009, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mnr.gov.cn\/sj\/tjgb\/\">from 49,000 hectares to more than 200,000 ha<\/a> (more than 500,000 acres) per year, representing a nearly 20% annualized growth for a decade.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Evergrande debuted on the Hong Kong Exchange in 2009, scarcely 12 years after private ownership of property had been introduced. It had completed more than 4 million square meters (44 million sf) of property development, with more than 40 million square meters (440 million sf) of additional properties under development. By the measure of its land bank, which was over 500 million sqm in size, Evergrande was already the largest real estate developer in China.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1318\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/Screen-Shot-2023-04-06-at-2.42.28-PM.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"526\" height=\"311\" \/>\r\n<figcaption><span style=\"font-size: 10px; font-family: Geologica;\">Evergrande&#8217;s IPO Prospectus<\/span><\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Already in 2009, Evergrande&#8217;s size was staggering, but its prospectus seems almost quaint in retrospect. It was a pure play real estate developer, in the business of residential real estate <em>only<\/em>, building villas, townhouses, condominiums, and high rises.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">The company had three product lines: a high-end series, a mid-to mid-high end series, and a <strong>\u201ctourism-related series\u201d<\/strong> under the banner of the &#8220;Evergrande Splendor&#8221; product, a mix of residential and resort elements, with hotels, commercial, and conference facilities.\u00a0 In the existence of this &#8220;tourism series&#8221; were hints of what was to come.<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<h1 class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-heading\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"The_Importance_of_Cultural_Tourism\"><\/span><strong>The Importance of Cultural Tourism<\/strong><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h1>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">After its IPO, business boomed for Evergrande, and boomed for the rest of the country too. China made it out of the Global Financial Crisis unscathed, driven by what was (at the time) an unprecedented fiscal stimulus of more than half a trillion dollars (4 trillion RMB).<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">For the next decade, real estate and construction-related industries would account for an increasingly large share of China&#8217;s GDP, reaching a peak of <a href=\"https:\/\/scholar.harvard.edu\/files\/rogoff\/files\/the_size_of_chinas_real_estate_sector.pdf\">nearly one-third of all economic output<\/a>. The country turned into a construction zone. Apartment flats were built in a matter of months, subway lines and bridges and airports arriving by quick delivery.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Theme park development was booming too. In fact, theme park development had been booming for almost twenty years, ever since the early success of Shenzhen OCT.<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1319 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/Picture1.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" \/><\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" style=\"text-align: center;\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Enter_Theme_Parks\"><\/span><span style=\"font-size: 40px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\"><strong>Enter Theme Parks<\/strong><\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Started in 1985, the Shenzhen OCT master plan development was an experiment by the state-owned Overseas Chinese Town to draw visitation to Shenzhen by creating tourism destinations.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">By the early 1990s, the Shenzhen OCT zone had opened the Splendid China Folk Village and Window of the World miniatures parks. Widely recognized as the country&#8217;s first &#8220;theme parks&#8221;, the attractions allowed guests to visit the major landmarks of both China and the world in \u201cjust three hours\u201d, with replicas of the Great Wall, Taj Mahal, Eiffel Tower, pyramids, and other famous places.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">They were centerpieces to lushly landscaped master-planned grounds with gardens and pedestrian walkways, and rows of residences.\u00a0 The apartment blocks were a hit, due to their location, and the theme park even more so.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1316\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/5c9f0e3e498e079efef64f27.png\" alt=\"\" \/>\r\n<figcaption><span style=\"font-size: 10px; font-family: Geologica;\">Window of the World<\/span><\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">After receiving a flood of visitors, and paying back its investment capital within a few short years, OCT rolled out two more theme parks in quick succession, one of which was <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Happy_Valley_Shenzhen\">Happy Valley,<\/a> the first of the now-ubiquitous ride park chain.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Shenzhen OCT became renowned nationwide for its success, which in retrospect was as much due to its master-planned, long-term groundwork as it was to just building novel land uses like theme parks. In fact, OCT had originally been widely ridiculed for spending six months just on the landscaping of the grounds, a timeframe during which entire city blocks could have been built.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">In the minds of real estate developers nationwide, however, theme parks and residential real estate became inextricably linked.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">So much so, that the history of Chinese real estate can\u2019t be understood without understanding the role of theme parks, or these \u201cculture tourism products\u201d.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<h1 class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-heading\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Theme_Park_Frenzy\"><\/span><span style=\"font-size: 40px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\"><strong>Theme Park Frenzy<\/strong><\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h1>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">As a relic of its history of central-planning, China&#8217;s government was used to setting targets for GDP growth, and the local governments were used to hitting them by any means possible. After private ownership of real estate was formalized, local governments began hitting these targets by increasingly resorting to&#8230;land sales.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">At their peak, land sales accounted for <a href=\"https:\/\/asia.nikkei.com\/Spotlight\/Caixin\/China-s-plunging-land-sales-threaten-local-governments\">up to 40% of local government revenues<\/a>, the single most important source of revenues \u2013 even more than local taxes. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Land auctions were the focal point, the beginning, for the single most important segment of Chinese economic activity, which was real estate and construction.\u00a0 Unfortunately, these frenzied land auctions became riddled with corruption and opaque practices, one that the central authorities began to struggle to contain.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Theme parks took center stage.\u00a0 Following OCT\u2019s lead, real estate developers differentiated their bids by promising theme parks and \u201cculture tourism products\u201d embedded amongst the blocks of residential real estate.\u00a0 Such promises were a win-win situation \u2013 promising theme parks allowed real estate developers to acquire land at sub-market rates, while local governments were happy to receive such &#8220;culture tourism&#8221; products.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Not only would a theme park have the optics of giving something back to the people, whose ancestral lands were being sold to the forces of modern development, such \u201ccultural tourism products\u201d promised to draw visitors from far and wide, and be an economic engine with ripple effects across the entire economy.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">In between the lines, however, problems were emerging.\u00a0 Allegations of graft, cost stuffing, fraudulent loans, and outright bribery plagued the entire process, and moreover, everyone was discovering that while Shenzhen OCT was a great model, there was only one Shenzhen OCT.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Developers who won the bids lost interest in operating the parks once they were constructed \u2013 if they were even constructed at all.\u00a0 A theme park, to be operated over the long-term, with long-term phases of reinvestment, had no appeal alongside the lightning quick, astronomical profits one could earn on selling apartments and villas instead.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1332\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/image.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" \/>\r\n<figcaption><span style=\"font-size: 10px; font-family: Geologica;\">The unfinished Wuhan Universal Park<\/span><\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">All across the country, theme parks lay in states ranging from vacant land to half-finished construction, to built-but-not thriving.\u00a0 Already by the end of the 1990s, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sohu.com\/a\/40632464_130541\">over 90% of the 1,000 theme parks<\/a> dotting the country were unfinished, while thousands more were underway.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Scandals riddled the country.\u00a0 In Wuning, a theme park occupying 3 million square feet of prime city center land, was promised in return for the rights to commercial development.\u00a0 While the World Trade Center office tower was eventually built, construction on the theme park never proceeded much beyond land excavation.\u00a0 <a href=\"http:\/\/news.66wz.com\/system\/2010\/07\/04\/101973511.shtml\">When rains flooded the site, creating irresistible pools for local kids, three children tragically drowned<\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">After nearly two decades of fast and furious theme park-real estate construction, the authorities had had enough.\u00a0 In 2011, the State Council declared a moratorium on theme park construction, blasting the &#8220;blind construction of theme parks&#8221; that riddled the country. In addition to the suspension, each city was to generate and submit a list of all theme parks that were planned and under construction.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">For the next two years, theme parks were off the table.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<h1 class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-heading\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Theme_Park_Frenzy_Part_II\"><\/span><span style=\"font-size: 40px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\"><strong>Theme Park Frenzy, Part II<\/strong><\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h1>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">In 2013, the theme park moratorium was lifted, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.jiangsu.gov.cn\/art\/2013\/6\/8\/art_65017_346605.html\">with strict requirements for development<\/a>.\u00a0 Theme parks could only be constructed after \u201ccareful evaluation\u201d, such as feasibility studies, and could no longer be bundled into general real estate master plans.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">By this time, an entire generation of real estate developers had grown accustomed to thinking about theme parks as a necessary part of any master plan.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">The 2013 clarification set off another boom in theme park planning. Developers read the State Council\u2019s clarifications carefully, and began planning them more meticulously, bigger, better, and more unique.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Over the next few years, a flurry of extravagant theme park announcements were made by Evergrande&#8217;s peers, including <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2016-05-24\/billionaire-wang-says-disney-no-match-for-wanda-s-wolf-pack#xj4y7vzkg\">Wanda&#8217;s famous pronouncement that it would run Disney out of China<\/a> by investing in 13 theme parks at the same time, investing $47 billion to do so.<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter is-resized\"><a href=\"https:\/\/zeitgeist-usa.com\/portfolio\/item-1\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-508\" src=\"https:\/\/zeitgeist-usa.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/06\/1-Bird_s-Eye-6_18_14-1024x536.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" \/><\/a>\r\n<figcaption><span style=\"font-size: 10px; font-family: Geologica;\">Journey to the West Theme Park, Source: Zeitgeist<\/span><\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Zhonghong Holdings announced, among other things, billion-dollar theme parks to be based on the story of Journey to the West, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.prnewswire.com\/news-releases\/zhonghong-group-completes-acquisition-of-21-equity-interest-in-seaworld-entertainment-inc-300453475.html\">and a 20% equity stake in US-based Seaworld<\/a>. Similarly, Riverside Investment Group announced a partnership with Six Flags to roll out no less than six branded theme park resorts, with $40 billion in total investment. Seemingly, every major IP found a Chinese partner to develop a theme park based on it, from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.prnewswire.com\/news-releases\/amcham-south-china-brings-paramount-parks-to-guangzhou-shenzhen-to-build-hollywood-china-dream-city-300146081.html\">Paramount<\/a>, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.forbes.com\/sites\/dougyoung\/2015\/05\/20\/rupert-murdoch-tip-toes-back-to-china-with-theme-park-retail-plans\/?sh=3669f0a15a15\">Fox<\/a>, Dreamworks, Lionsgate, Nickelodeon, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.caranddriver.com\/news\/a15346011\/ferraris-third-theme-park-is-coming-to-china\/\">Ferrari<\/a>, Sanrio, Sega, and others. At one point there was even a theme park to be based on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.thesun.co.uk\/sport\/football\/3706636\/lionel-messi-theme-park-china\/\">Lionel Messi<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<h1 class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-heading\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Evergrandes_Ambitions\"><\/span><span style=\"font-size: 40px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\"><strong>Evergrande\u2019s Ambitions<\/strong><\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h1>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Evergrande\u2019s &#8220;Cultural Tourism&#8221; segment had existed for decades.\u00a0 At the time of Evergrande&#8217;s IPO in 2009, Cultural Tourism accounted for 20% of sales, and consisted of residences that were supplemented by resort-like amenities, such as large pools, gardens, and other landscaping.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Like all of its peers, Evergrande had never been in the business of theme parks. And like all of its peers, this reality didn&#8217;t deter its ambitions.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">In 2015, the company made strides into the cultural tourism business by commencing work on what would be one of the biggest private real estate developments in the history of the world.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Evergrande <a href=\"http:\/\/www.china.org.cn\/business\/2015-12\/31\/content_37432307.htm\">announced the $25 billion Hainan Flower Island development<\/a>, a 500-acre, man-made island sculpted off the coast of Hainan to resemble \u2013 you guessed it, a flower \u2013 with a theme park, waterpark, botanical garden, hotels, convention center, all surrounded by luxury apartments and villas.\u00a0 It would be nearly 10 times the size of any other Evergrande development.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">After commencing work on Flower Island, Evergrande doubled down.\u00a0 In 2017, Chairman Hui Ka Yan declared that Evergrande, too, would enter the theme park business in zest by building no less than 17 theme parks and 20 waterparks all across the country, more or less at the same time.\u00a0 It announced the standard size $40 billion budget,\u00a0and declared that such development would be led by multiple Fairylands and Water Worlds.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1323\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/HIGH21180_996794.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" \/><\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Fairyland would be a theme park designed for children and teenagers, based on fairy tales, mythology, Chinese culture, and history. It would be an all-indoor park, with 33 buildings each housing a large-scale amusement programs, for 33 attractions in total, which Evergrande boasted was 1.5 times the scale of an average Disney park. Each park would be located in a market surrounded by at least 80 million people, and thus attract 15 to 20 million visitors annually.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Evergrande Water World would similarly be a world-class, all-indoor hot springs waterpark and entertainment complex. The park would have more than 100 water &#8220;entertainment programs&#8221;, such as the world&#8217;s largest wave pools, parent-child &#8220;water cities&#8221;, artificial beaches, water walls, world&#8217;s largest drop slides, world&#8217;s longest indoor rafting rivers, and world&#8217;s &#8220;most exciting water roller coasters&#8221;.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Rounding out the theme- and waterparks would be all-around cultural tourism destinations with hot springs, ice and snow parks, commercial streets, convention centers, museums, and hotels.<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\" style=\"text-align: center;\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Operating_Realities\"><\/span><span style=\"font-size: 40px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\"><strong>Operating Realities<\/strong><\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h2>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">As you might imagine, there were several challenges to Evergrande\u2019s ambitions.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">The first was a matter of finances, and it would be the one that ultimately derailed its plans.\u00a0 How Evergrande operated was no different from any other developer in China.\u00a0 This world-building on a scale that had never been seen before was all financed with debt.\u00a0 Lots of it.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/EG-Chart-2.png\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1327\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/EG-Chart-2.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">At the time of its IPO in 2009, Evergrande had 20 billion RMB of debt on its books, and sought to raise another 20 billion.\u00a0 This balance grew from 20 billion to over 200 billion within a span of eight years. Even as it grew, however, profitability remained elusive<\/span>.\u00a0<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/EG-Chart-1.png\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1326\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/EG-Chart-1.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Despite throwing ever-growing amounts of cash into development, the company generated only a single year of positive cash flow between 2007 and 2018.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Instead, liabilities ballooned, financing the purchase of ever-growing amounts of land, the development of more than a million square feet of apartments and villas per year, and record revenues \u2013 along with record costs.\u00a0 Federal and state taxes ate away at any profits Evergrande was able to generate, so much so that one gets the sense that after a few years, the company was growing desperate.<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/img.caixin.com\/2021-11-22\/163756423373853.jpg\" alt=\"Shares of Evergrande's Electric Car Unit Jump 11% on Fundraising Plan -  Caixin Global\" width=\"600\" \/>\r\n<figcaption><span style=\"font-size: 10px; font-family: Geologica;\">Evergrande Auto<\/span><\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Its entry into the theme park- and island terraforming-business looks like a hopeful pivot into anything that would help it turn the corner &#8211; to say nothing of its expanding diversification into electric automobiles (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.wsj.com\/articles\/china-evergrandes-electric-vehicle-business-to-raise-347-million-from-share-sales-11637383663\">Evergrande Auto<\/a>), online streaming (Hengten Networks), online property and automobile marketplace (Fangchebao Group), health food (Evergrande Spring), and healthcare (Evergrande Healthcare).<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Again, the problem with theme park development and island terraforming was that Evergrande had never done it before.\u00a0 This was the second major challenge facing Evergrande.\u00a0 Given its inexperience in theme parks and luxury resort islands, what to do?\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\"><strong>Evergrande pushed into the theme park industry no-holds-barred<\/strong>.\u00a0 Its team generated designs for Fairyland and Water World that outside designers deemed unbuildable.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Initial designs for the all-weather, all-indoor Fairyland were a series of enclosed pavilions that guests would have to walk between.\u00a0 An inner ring road connected each of the pavilions, enclosed by an 8&#215;8 walkway, and an outer road was traversed by tram.\u00a0 The problem was that the estimated construction costs for these outer shells were equivalent to the cost of all the rides themselves, not to mention that the HVAC requirements for the buildings alone appeared to exceed total projected revenues for the parks.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter is-resized\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ideattack.com\/evergrande-fairytale-world\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.ideattack.com\/media\/2020\/07\/Evergrande-Fairytale-World_01.jpg\" alt=\"Evergrande Fairytale World - IDEATTACK\" width=\"550\" \/><\/a>\r\n<figcaption><span style=\"font-size: 10px; font-family: Geologica;\">Fairyland, Source: IdeAttack<\/span><\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">The first designers who deemed the buildings outrageous or unbuildable were summarily fired; only those that had phrased their reactions in more political, acceptable terms, remained.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">For the next few years, Evergrande fumbled their way through the process, signing and firing dozens of designers, as they engaged vendor after vendor to discover the right themes and concepts.\u00a0 Everything they laid their eyes on were plain vanilla, for they wanted mind-blowing and unique &#8211; \u00a0at one point, internal managers suggested Romeo &amp; Juliet as a theme, and challenged the designers to follow suit.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Months of wrangling left Evergrande disenchanted, and instead the team sought to circumvent the outside designers by creating their own Imagineering team.\u00a0 This would consist of 300 \u2018creative masters\u2019 hired from all around the world to consult and build out the Fairylands.\u00a0 After marathon sessions of 18-hour teleconference days, this was also deemed an ineffective idea.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">In 2018, the central government issued yet another theme park ban. This edict was even more strongly worded, and specifically sought to limit the rampant construction of theme parks with &#8220;unclear concepts&#8221;, plagued by &#8220;blind construction, imitation and plagiarism.&#8221; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.gov.cn\/xinwen\/2018-04\/09\/content_5281149.htm\">An additional string of mandates<\/a> sternly rebuked the illegal conversion of natural forests, parks, and green spaces, and the transgression of ecological protections and approval procedures.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Planning for the Fairylands and Water Worlds continued undeterred.<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<h1 class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-heading\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Death_Throes\"><\/span><span style=\"font-size: 40px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\"><strong>Death Throes<\/strong><\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h1>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">In late 2019, a virus emerged in Wuhan, one that would sweep the globe and shut off economic activity for years.\u00a0 In China, the shutdown was total and catastrophic, at least for the real estate industry, but the party\u2019s leaders used the time as an opportunity to catch up on some housekeeping.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Blanket bans on all sorts of activity were issued, from ones on skyscrapers to ones on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.scmp.com\/news\/people-culture\/article\/3129880\/chinese-government-bans-those-weird-buildings-xi-jinping-cant\">&#8220;ugly buildings&#8221;<\/a>. Affirming Xi Jinping&#8217;s declaration that houses <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2017-10-18\/xi-renews-call-housing-should-be-for-living-in-not-speculation#xj4y7vzkg\">&#8220;were for living in&#8221;<\/a>, rather than tools of speculation, the authorities crushed real estate developers by enacting the Three Red Lines policy in 2020, one that limited debt growth with stringent liquidity requirements.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">This crushed Evergrande. Like every other Chinese real estate developer, debt growth was the company&#8217;s engine. Debt was Evergrande&#8217;s primary source of cash, because the company had never been cash flow positive on an operating basis.<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/Screen-Shot-2023-04-03-at-10.21.23-AM.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" \/>\r\n<figcaption><span style=\"font-size: 10px; font-family: Geologica;\">Stock price, Evergrande. Source: Koyfin<\/span><\/figcaption>\r\n<\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">With no further debt to finance its projects and growth, the extent of Evergrande&#8217;s troubles became clear. It was an end to the confidence game. After its IPO, for nearly a decade, Evergrande had had no trouble raising bonds and funds from investors who believed in the story of its growth and outsize expectations.\u00a0 Forays into theme parks, island building, healthcare, and streaming websites almost seemed to further heighten its glamour and appeal. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">But now, the spigot of money had effectively been shut off. Scrambling, Evergrande pressed employees to buy homes and deleveraged where it could. But with no way to finance its operations anymore, the end was inevitable. Evergrande would go into default, de-list from the Hong Kong Exchange, and effectively stop operating altogether, leaving thousands of apartment blocks unfinished, and the fate of its theme parks up in the air.<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<h1 class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-heading\"><span class=\"ez-toc-section\" id=\"Late_Blooming_Flower\"><\/span><span style=\"font-size: 40px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\"><strong>Late Blooming Flower<\/strong><\/span><span class=\"ez-toc-section-end\"><\/span><\/h1>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">The pandemic left the fate of the Fairylands and Water Worlds uncertain;\u00a0to date, none have been completed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">But whether through luck or dogged determination, Evergrande&#8217;s most ambitious development pushed through the pandemic and financial troubles brought on by the Three Red Lines policy, eventually opening in 2021.<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1320\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/Screen-Shot-2023-04-06-at-3.02.17-PM.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" \/><\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">By late 2018, the project management for Flower Island had almost been singularly left to a small team of Evergrande specialists and a single outside team, owner\u2019s rep firm <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ravensuncreative.com\/\">Raven Sun Creative<\/a>.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Five years into the project, the state of Flower Island was representative of a project for a firm seeking to do something that no one in the world had never done before, let alone something it had any remote experience with.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">In its ambitions, it was a representation of the age.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Louis Alfieri, president of Raven Sun, helped the small team to analyze, produce, and execute plans that characteristically included spectacular, mind-blowing, and often unbuildable concept designs, across multiple project sites.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">The design drawings, which were preliminary at best, included almost no infrastructure for an island that would include a movie studio, three proposed convention centers, 18 spas, 3 theme parks, multiple hotels, botanical garden and arboretum, 8 museums, and a host of other amenities.\u00a0 There was no parking, nor room for enough buses, no train stops, no unloading areas. Fundamentals had to be revisited en masse such as maintenance access, rockwork methodology, fish tank access, animal welfare practices, and guest sightlines for major installations.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1341\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/image-1.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" \/><\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">For months, experts, consultants, and Evergrande internal teams were in gridlock about the direction of the attractions.\u00a0 Cultural experts argued over the interpretation of Chinese epics, over the minutest of details from the stone texture to how various characters should be represented.\u00a0 Some concepts were deemed to be untouchable, such as time travel themes due to the approaching 100-year anniversary of the CCP.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">While the retrofitting, assemblage, and puzzle-like management of the island was proceeding, Chairman Hui decided that the island should host the world\u2019s largest lightshow, with projection maps on every building.\u00a0 This, too, was retrofitted and built into the under-construction island.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1342\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/image-2.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" \/><\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Through the collapse of its empire, the unveiling of $300 billion in liabilities, the pandemic, the unraveling of Evergrande\u2019s theme park plans, and millions of dollars in fines for environmental damage done to Hainan\u2019s coastline during construction, this wild and wonderful development continued\u2026developing.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">It was like a symbol, a representation, a last gasp of the age, a symbol of the grandeur that Evergrande always aimed for.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><iframe title=\"Ocean Flower Island: World&#039;s Biggest Mega Construction Project\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/GpoqGYa1rrw?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\r\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">In 2021, Flower Island opened with a fairytale theme park, marine animal ocean park, botanical garden, and an audacious waterpark with a 20-story tall mountain, floating pools, and a movie theater on its lake.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">These were supplemented by five hotel resorts, one a 5,000-room complex of four European-style castles in ocean, forest, glacier, and desert themes, beachside private villas, and a hot springs hotel with more than 120 characteristic hot spring pools from Japan, Thailand, Italy, Finland, and Turkey.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1343\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/image-3.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" \/><\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">A Sports and Fitness Center boasted more than 130 \u201cprofessional sports facilities\u201d, including swimming pools, basketball and tennis courts, archery ranges.\u00a0 Eight modern, monolithic buildings comprised the museum complex, while a 100,000 square meter (11 million sf) international convention hall boasted more than 100 conference halls.\u00a0 Functional areas abounded, including 9 European-style wedding halls, 40,000 square meters of active space for children, adventure, and skateboarding, and a more than 200,000 square meter (2.2 million sf) film and television studio, with over 17 studios, one of which was underwater.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Further amenities included a yacht club, 65-meter sightseeing tower, sightseeing trains, more than 1 million square meters of open gardens, parks, and white sand beaches, a 12-screen luxury cinema, concert hall, a street exclusively made for tea shops, 1,600-seat theater, 150,000 square meter shopping center, a complex of bars, luxury karaoke rooms, and nightclubs, and commercial walking streets.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\r\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-large is-resized\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/Screen-Shot-2023-04-06-at-3.07.47-PM.png\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1321\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/04\/Screen-Shot-2023-04-06-at-3.07.47-PM.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">The audacity was unparalleled.\u00a0 The concept was unprecedented.\u00a0 That it was executed at all was improbable.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">The raw energy and ambition of China\u2019s construction boom over the past thirty years was peerless; the largest, most rapid building boom in the history of the world.\u00a0 During these years, hundreds of billions of dollars of development were dreamed up.\u00a0 Some were built, others failed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">\r\n\r\n<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Let us appreciate that Flower Island exists as a symbol of that age, of the hope and ambition and raw, zany, wild dreams of the era.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n<hr \/>\r\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; font-family: 'EB Garamond';\">Interested in this subject of theme park manias?\u00a0 Be sure to check out our founder <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Never-Before-Seen-History-World\/dp\/B0DS5QBV5D\/\">Won&#8217;s authoritative book on the subject<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>At its height, Evergrande Group was the largest real estate developer in the world, with contracted sales amounting to more than 700 billion RMB (~$100 billion) in 2020, and a billion square feet under construction at nearly 800 projects around China.\u00a0 Appropriately for its ambitions, Evergrande was also in the stages of building theme parks [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1983,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[139,9],"tags":[10,115],"class_list":["post-1305","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-history","category-theme-parks","tag-china","tag-evergrande"],"acf":{"":"","bfi_title":"","bfi_title_2":"","bfi_description":"","chart_image":"","chart_title":"","chart_description":"","bc_title":"","bc_sub_title":"","bc_content":"","bc_right_side_content":"","highlighted_image":"","highlighted_sub_title":"","highlighted_title":"","highlighted_bottom_text":"","highlighted_button_text":"","highlighted_button_link":"","below_highlighted_title":"","below_highlighted_sub_title":"","below_highlighted_content":"","below_highlighted_right_side_title":"","below_highlighted_list":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1305","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1305"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1305\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1983"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1305"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1305"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparkdb.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1305"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}