At present, more than 55% of the world’s population lives in cities, and this is expected to rise to 68% by2050, with nearly 90% of the increase in the urban population occurring in Asia and Africa, especially for India and China.1Thanks to the rapid urbanization, the proportion of China’s urban population has increased from 17.92% in 1978 to 58.5% in2017, which is expected to exceed 60% in 2020.2The urbanization process has brought about the rapid socio-economic development of cities, yet the rapid urbanization process has also led to some problems related to urban development, such as over-consumption of resources, increasingly prominent pollution, frequent occurrence of ‘urban diseases’ and extreme weather events, continuous deterioration of living environment quality, etc., which have brought new challenges to sustainable urban design. Under this background, analyzing the basic theories and transformation of urban design, discussing new concepts, technologies, and methods of urban design, as well as scientifically recognizing the challenges and opportunities of the development of urban design can provide effective solutions based on urban design for outstanding problems in the rapid process of urban construction and sustainable development.
