By Pu Jiaolong
At a city council meeting on Oct. 23, Mayor Yao Gaoyuan announced that Hangzhou had officially become a member of the nation's megacities. This is the first time an official has explicitly stated that Hangzhou has taken a brand-new step.
According to the Chinese standard of classification, cities with a permanent population between 5-10 million in the urban area are supercities, and those with a permanent population over 10 million are megacities. In 2022, statistics show that the urban population of Hangzhou is 7.09 million, and the temporary population of the urban area is 2.931 million, making a total of 10.021 million people in the urban area. Hangzhou has also become the 10th megacity following Shanghai, Beijing, Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Chongqing, Chengdu, Tianjin, Dongguan and Wuhan.
The promotion to a mega-city, fundamentally, reflects the degree of modernization of a city and its influence on the surrounding area. A city with a large number of permanent residents will put a higher demand on the city's capacity, which will propel the city to gather strong economic and industrial strength, provide more and better employment opportunities, and improve the city's infrastructure and public services, all these means a happier life for the people living in the city.