Hao Rong

This is my master thesis research project utilizing data science to help with social issues. The motivation is to complement government’s insight of market regulation in dynamic situations. The housing bubble is one of the most urgent social problems to address in China. To guide investment behaviors and to make effective regulatory policies, it is essential to know how market discussion shift and to tackle the problem with well-designed strategies.

Since most of the market prediction and evaluation from individual or agency are posted online in the form of text, text mining could be a potent tool in extracting information. This research focuses on adapting text mining technique to obtain valuable information from text data and making statistical convincing inference on estimating market expectation. Topic modeling and word embedding algorithms are used on curated data to filter out internet noise and to retrieve valuable information related to public discussions of real estate price.

Under Construction.

This is a team research under the SCUT ‘Hundred-steps’ research training project. In the past decade, E-commerce has thrived with the popularization of the Internet. It also has generated a new urban form. Driven by the low entrance standard and flexible work location of ‘Taobao’, e-commerce brings to life a range of burgeoning startup small-to-medium enterprises in urban villages where business cost is low and transportation is convenient.

This research does an in-depth case study of a Taobao village in Guangzhou to explain the special business ecosystem and its spontaneous economic agglomeration process. Besides the mechanism study, it also points out that the threats faced by e-commerce sound a warning note that city planners should seek to preserve the connection within the e-commerce communities, and e-commerce practitioners should adjust their positioning in urban development.

This is my undergraduate capstone project co-operated with Sci-city Planning Research Corporation. Jian-Yatzs Basin area is a 212.18 Sq km rural area consist of 5 towns’ terrain. There are 2 major rivers, Jian and Yatzs river that flow through the site. The area was known for its rich natural resource and appealing landscape. However, with the development of the polluting industries, the basin area lost its original beauty.

To revive the economic development and follow the call of ecological transition from the central government, this project involves making the basin area environmental attractive and industrial sustainable. In keeping with the slogan of ‘Home of Egrets’, we focus on developing a strategical plan that encourages new economic growth, developing mode, and ecological infrastructures in order to guide the following constructive plan to a potent direction.

This is a course project of City Design. The old Guangzhou Main Train Station was built in 1951 and has been redecorated several times to adapt to the growing railway traffic. However, due to the station’s inability to meet the modern transportation system demand, the Station need to be rebuilt to serve as the new ‘face’ of Guangzhou. Meanwhile, a lot of small businesses are gathered around the station which should also be considered in the redevelopment plan.

In this planning practice, we set out a vision of ‘Two façade of Guangzhou’ using architectural and landscape design to connect the old south entrance with the new north entrance. At the same time, we try to preserve and encourage the original commercial activities with thoughtful resettlement. A significant portion of the station is relocated underground to save more space for the public. By organizing different functionalities together, we vision an ecological-friendly area that enhances both the cultural heritage and the modern public space.

This is a course project of Site Planning. The site is 3.43 hectares and is located near the Public Policy and Business Management School of SCUT. It includes several important historical buildings like the old Law School, the Hundred-Steps Stairs, and the Sundial back. Due to the expanding demand from the university, we urge to find space for campus events, activities, and parking space with the consideration of preserving the campus heritage.

To utilize space without interfering the structures on the ground, this design put forward an innovative idea of using the underground space by building tunnels and parking structures. It also preserves a precious automobile-free area on campus that students can have a quiet and dignified sanctuary to reimagine the historical scene from the last century. A new student center is also built on the west side of the site to meet the increasing need for students’ activities.

This is a design competition project held by Hong Kong Civil Engineering and Development Department. The competition’s theme is “Showcase of Lung Tsun Bridge”. In this project, we focus our design on the preservation of the bridge remnants and the revelation of its historical significance, while also integrating the corridor with adjacent developments.

Aimed to transform the district into an open-street museum, we set out a vision of ‘Mountain, Sea, Bridge’ in our design to present a symbolic sense of Hong Kong history. Design components of origamis, spirals, and water are used to represents the natural and cultural elements in the urban development. We also add vertical forests in our design to remind people of the importance of environmental ecology since Hong Kong is threatened by the increasing sea level caused by global warming.