Travel Guide Zhengzhou 郑州

Overcrowded, dirty, polluted… Zhengzhou presents at first sight all the characteristics of a Chinese agglomeration to avoid. But it is not counting on its rich past and the sites surrounding it.HistoryZhengzhou, the capital of Henan province, soon became an important urban center in the region.The first traces of sedentarization, updated in the 1950 s, dates back more than 5,000 years with the village of Dahecun, located a few kilometers north of Zhengzhou. Zhengzhou would have been the capital of the second Chinese dynasty, that of the Shang (1480-1122 BC), but never recovered that status later: under the Han, Zhengzhou dark in darkness under the north and south dynasties. It again becomes an emblematic place under the Communist regime: in February 1923, Zhengzhou was the site of an important uprising of the railway workers who revolted against the disproportionate power of the "lords of war" (commemorative tower of the Martyrs of February 7, 1923).The Maoist era will raise Zhengzhou first row. In 1954, the city became the political, economic and cultural capital of Henan, and will be part of the industrialization plan of the 1950 s. As such, it will be severely affected (the province like its population) by the so-called Great Leap Forward policy. TodayThe current urban fabric is imbued with this urban science imported by Soviet experts, developed during the first two decades of the People's Republic: route of the streets cutting at straight angles, monotonous of a standard architecture in the form of residential bars, industrial buildings located in the heart of the city.Today, this eminently industrial city has nearly 2 million inhabitants, a very large part of which is employed in the textile industries: Zhengzhou is in the center of a large cotton plain.