1017 
REARCH ON THE CURRENT STATUS AND HISTORY TRANSFORMATION OF 
HUTONG IN BEIJING IMPERIAL CITY BASED ON GIS TECHNIQUE 
Pinxiang CHEN , Ming DONG , Junhui ZHANG 
Beijing Institute of Surveying and Mapping, 15, Yangfangdian, Haidian District, Beijing, China - cpx@bism.cn 
Commission: Special Session (1) 
KEYWORDS: Geographical information science, Spatial Database, Digital photogrammetry, Comparative analysis, Heritage 
Conservation 
ABSTRACT: 
Hutong is a special cultural heritage of Beijing. This paper research Hutong in the imperial city of Beijing, mainly in 7 typical years 
from the found of PRC till now, respectively 1949, 1965, 1980, 1990, 2003, 2005 and 2007, produce GIS data of 7 typical years, with 
accurate geography coordinate and attribute information, including name, built age, demolished age, start location and end location 
of each Hutong. Famous Hutong GIS data is produced based on Hutong GIS data of 2007, as well as Hutong inside of the protection 
regions of history and culture GIS data. In order to manage these GIS data efficiently, a spatial database was built, to meet the 
requirement of search, extract, compare and analyze to historic Hutong data. Further analyze to the transition of Hutong indicates, 
from 1949 to 2007, Hutong in imperial city has decreased by 55% in the number by 48% in the length. From 2005 to 2007, the 
decrease trend of Hutong has been held back efficiently, the protection of Hutong direct to a prosperous future. 
1. INTRODUCTION 
Hutong, also be called as alley or lane, is a special cultural 
heritage of Beijing. From the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasty till 
nowadays, Hutong of Beijing imperial city has the history of 
over 800 years, it bom the massive weight of history and culture 
of China. The research and protection on Hutong has become 
focus of all circles in Beijing nowadays. 
This paper Using Geographical /nformation Science technique, 
researching Hutong in Beijing imperial city of 7 typical years 
from 1949 to 2007, respectively 1949, 1965, 1980, 1990, 2002, 
2005 and 2007. 
Based on the research above, a transition data of Hutong is 
produced, it bears the transition from 1949 to 2007, and 
represents the Hutong of newly built and demolished in each 
typical year. 
During the long history of Hutong, many famous people or 
events had happened in Hutong, these Hutong bear testimony to 
that history, so the “famous Hutong” is in the scope of our 
research. Nowadays, Beijing has setup some protection regions 
of history and culture, had Hutong inside of the regions been 
protected very well? This paper shows you the amount and 
distribution of Hutong inside of these regions. 
In order to manage these data efficiently, a spatial database was 
built, it meets the requirement of search, extract, compare and 
analyze to historic Hutong data. 
Based on the researches above, by comparing the amount and 
length of Hutong in 7 typical years, we can see the transition 
tendency of Hutong clearly, the transitional reason were 
analyzed in this paper. 
2. METHOD 
2.1 The Criterion and Scope of Research 
Beijing Hutong sprung from the Yuan dynasty, it means a small 
street between two courtyards, and compose the road system in 
the imperial city. Nowadays, the concept of Hutong is the same 
as the Yuan dynasty. 
In the Yuan dynasty, the width of street is 25 meter, the back 
street is 13 meter, and the Hutong is 6~7 meter 1 ' 1 , with the 
development of society, today’s roads are wider than past, so the 
criterion of our research on the width of Hutong has been 
changed. The new criterion to define Hutong is as follows: road 
which has the basic character of alley and hasn’t been expanded 
to avenue, not more than 20 meter wide, hasn’t buses passing 
through, doesn’t be included in inhabitant district. 
In the Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasty, Hutong mainly located 
inside of Beijing imperial city, in order to keep the consistency 
of history, the geographic scope of our research is inside of the 
imperial city, the scope of the second ring road of Beijing today, 
the area of which is 62.5 square kilometer. 
In order to hold the character of the evolvement and 
development course of Hutong in 58 years from 1949 to 2007 
exactly, we select 7 typical years, respectively 1949 (for 
People’s Republic of China was founded in this year), 1965 (for 
widely transformation on the name of Hutong has been done in 
this year), 1980 (the initial stages of reformation and opening of 
Beijing), 1990 (the widely housebreaking and construction 
period of Beijing) and the latest three years 2003 ,2005 and 
2007 to research. 
2.2 Basic Data 
Substantial researches had been carried out to Hutong of Beijing 
imperial city by expert on folklore, chorography, architecture,