"Where there is water，there is the direction of home.Along the river is the way back home."Water is the record of the initial state of life evolution，nourishing all living creatures.Water，the aggregation of rivers，is the blood of city.Water，seeking for the brightness of culture，is the eyes of city.And water，activating the inspiration of mind，is the wisdom of city.While taking a stroll along the river，man's dreams are lighten up with the sparkling inverted image of the city.Like lingering on the layout of time！An ideal city should have an attractive river.It's not the memory fragments of riverbed，but a clean and beautiful home.Rivers should be given a full meaning of its own.The integrated design of river should be based on the ecological restoration and biological habitat reconstruction techniques，and blend in urban public recreation and the creative design of culture.Therefore the river will regain a health and poetic atmosphere，which is the dream picture of every city where people's eyes will be clear，their thoughts will be enlightened，and children's laughter and flowery will be penetrated together.
The return of rivers is an attempt of rivers narrative and theme space.What in front of us is not a separate definition of waterfront landscape，but a combination of several waterfronts.In recent years，Shanghai Municipal Engineering Design Institute has successful put into practice several open spaces of urban waterfront projects of domestic water system governance.We have made a lot of design challenges in the whole process in the areas of ecology，water environment，water city，water culture，water economy，and have continuously absorbed in principles like ecological balance，humane care，so that the design functions of urban public safety，public recreation and creative space that river carries can be fully interpreted.We have built a number of representative works of domestic high—quality urban waterfront public open spaces，and have repeatedly won a number of major awards at home and abroad such as the IFLA Land Resource Management Excellence Award，National Best Engineering Design Award，Shanghai Survey and Design Excellence Awards.
It is the need of time that determines the future direction of landscape profession.From Suzhou River(the mother river of Shanghai )to Huangpu River，from Wusongkou to the Yangtze River，Xiang River，Zhu River and Gan River….Our team has left systematic thinking for the future development of the profession，through the technology practice and land research of many rivers in the country，pursuing the integration of cross—border disciplines.
Our team has always emphasized on the landscape as a kind of land resource management design.It is a logical method of respecting the combination of rational cognition and emotional argument，based on the natural science and social science.It is closely linked with disciplines such as Urban Planning，Architectural Design，Engineering Design，and Environmental Art，and needed to be supported by such disciplines as Geography，Ecology，Environmental Science，Behavioral psychology，Aesthetics，Sociology，and Economics.It is not only a visual scene，but also a perceived scene，and gives the society a temporal experience.
In some landscape cases of urban public open space，our team has been committed to researches of the spatial scale of the city，the user's lifestyle，as well as the city's natural ecological pattern.These studies are based on the common interests of the public.It is the care and dynamically adjustment under the premise of understanding the laws of nature and the cultural re—creation in the process of evolution.The landscape design to us is a modern science taking the experience of its users as the starting point，based on land and characterized by the replacement of nature，taking time as its main line.It focuses on the harmonious coexistence of all living things.
On the occasion of the 60th birthday of Shanghai Municipal Engineering Design Institute，we have published "The Return of Rivers"which has compiled into a book about 20representative works about domestic waterfront practice of our institute over the past decade.It aims to express the innovative practice thinking under the collaboration of multi—disciplines of our young team，in the hope of leading to more sharing and discussion，and continue to seek a new way of contemporary Chinese landscape design.
Shanghai Municipal Engineering Design Institute (Group)Co.Ltd.
Landscape Design Institute
President Zhong Lyu
2014.8.12
