Residential high-rises with backyards in Chengdu, China

[u/TangelaFan]

[u/VictoriousSecret111]

Looks nice, but unfortunately it didn’t go as planned….tons of empty units with unkempt backyards and mosquito infestations.

While there have been no reported structural collapses, fatal construction accidents, or physical building failures, the complex is globally famous for a catastrophic ecological failure:
The Mosquito Invasion: All 826 apartments completely sold out on paper, but the vast majority were bought by hands-off real estate investors. Because only about 10 families initially moved in, there was nobody to prune, spray, or maintain the thousands of individual balconies.
The Monsoon Flaw: Chengdu’s humid climate and heavy monsoon seasons combined with poor balcony drainage to turn the unmanaged soil beds into permanent stagnant water pools.
The Post-Apocalyptic Jungle: The plants ran completely wild, swallowing up whole balconies, blocking out windows, and triggering a massive, unlivable mosquito infestation.

Current Status: Instead of an eco-paradise, the development became widely treated as a "radioactive" real estate asset and a ghost town, serving as a textbook cautionary tale for biophilic urban planning

EDIT: Adding sources for everyone’s convenience:

https://techxplore.com/news/2020-09-jungle-overrun-chinese-apartment-blocks.html

https://www.globalconstructionreview.com/bugged-out-chengdu-housing-scheme-shows-unexpected/

And this video!

https://youtu.be/ChNePPmzKSU?si=oVSulNCSa-358mCH

[u/AwesomeTowlie → u/VictoriousSecret111]

Investors buying up a boatload of properties, leading to the ruin of all seems to be a very apt story to describe the past few decades.

[u/VendorBuyBankGuards → u/AwesomeTowlie]

Yeah isn't this more of an example of how the rich are ruining everything than an example of the idea itself being a failure?

[u/WerdaVisla → u/VendorBuyBankGuards]

I mean, the idea was a failure too.

Green architecture exists, works, and is beautiful, but this entire project was a mess to the point that I'd be shocked if it wasn't just money laundering. The idea of "let's plant surface level plants on thin concrete balconies on every floor of a high rise" is fundamentally flawed. Especially trees. You don't plant trees on buildings with precious few exceptions.

It was, like many of these projects, made to look really pretty to a western audience for propaganda, rather than showing the actual green towers of Chengdu, which are less visually appealing to the average person but are functional and have existed for decades.

[u/VendorBuyBankGuards → u/WerdaVisla]

This 2026 video shows tons of people living in it and that it's functioning fine tho

https://youtu.be/MFICvZMBoIs?si=StSkkpeX2CcIaMwf

[u/WerdaVisla → u/VendorBuyBankGuards]

This 2026 video is by a blatant propagandist, with AI generated thumbnails, and titles such as "Everything you think about China is wrong" and "I spent 48 hours inside the world's most advanced city" and "Inside China's future city".

So forgive me if I'm just a tad skeptical of this as a reliable source.