Monday, February 1, 2010

CHINA Will a new city take shape in Inner Mongolia?

A Las Vegas-based company aims to build a massive “new world resort city” in northern China.

The city is called China Vegas, and it’ll spread over 24,700 acres of wilderness in Inner Mongolia, an autonomous region along the Russian border. If the concept takes hold -– and it’s a deliriously ambitious undertaking that's probably doomed to failure -– the place could eventually be home to 1 million people.

China Vegas will be made essentially from nothing, so it needs pretty much everything. The developers, China Holdings, Inc., have outlined plans to build houses, office and industrial space, shopping areas, hotels, a transportation network, parks, casinos, a variety of recreational and entertainment areas, and other amenities too numerous to list.

Julianna Lu, the company’s founder and chairperson, won’t disclose the city’s exact location, but she tells us that the master plan calls for three 18-hole golf courses, at least one of which will be capable of hosting a professional tournament.

China Holdings controls nearly 198,000 acres in Inner Mongolia, which encompasses eight provinces from Gansu on the west to Heilongjiang on the east. The company says it has a subsidiary, China Power, Inc., that develops wind farms, biomass plants, and other sources of energy.