The Brief Introduction of South Tower Park

South Tower Park is located in the south are of old Chenzhou urban area where is about 1.5kms away from Chenzhou central urban area. It is near Luoxian ling in the north side, connected with the expanded section of Guoqing road in the west side and near Xiangxue Avenue in south side. The 29.87hectares big park is a comprehensive mountain park with sound protection of cultural heritage and ecological condition.

In 1982, the former Chenzhou Municipal Government set a leader group of Chenzhou South Tower Park to prepare the construction of South Tower Park;

In 1996, Chenzhou South Park was formally built on the above basis by the government. It was a balance allocation unit then.

In 2005, Jiangxi Shengbo Industrial Development Co., Ltd. which was HK-funded company was introduced to handle the construction of South Tower Park by the way of investment attraction approved by Chenzhou Government. Followed the requirements of Chenzhou Government, South Tower Park was positioned as a municipal level comprehensive park which was with the theme of local historical folks. Shanghai Huadong Planning and Design Institute and Hunan Planning and Design Institute which are A-class qualified design institutes were hired to figure out the planning. On the basis of the park’s topography and practical condition, the park was divided into 6 parks. Following four ones have been finished yet.

1.Historical cultural activity park- South Tower Park: it is located in the west of the park. Centered with south tower, some other sceneries as Qingyuan gallery, Tingtao pavilion, the first landscape pavilion, Lingying square, south tower square, and etc. were set on there. All the sceneries are used to show the historical cultures of the South Tower. This park is the historical cultural zone of the whole park.

2.the aged activity park- harmonious park: it is located in the central part of the park. Small square in forest, Lemeixuan, bird park, and other sceneries were set there.

3.leisure park- Cuiwei park: it is also located in the central part of the park where is facilitated with some walk paths.

4.Chenzhou Happy World Amusement Park which is located in the northeast of the park is the biggest amusement park of south Hunan province. It was operated with corporation management. Currently, there are over 50kinds of recreation facilities available for tourists to enjoy their leisure time there.

More than 40million yuan was placed on the construction of the park in the four years long period. The former chaos grave was changed to be a comprehensive park with the functions of leisure, entertainment and fitness. The park was finished in 2009 and opened to the public for free on September 25 at the same year. Now it became one of the favorite parks of Chenzhou people. According to the data, the annual tourist amount received by the park is over 800,000 visitors.

1. Historical figures

According to the historical record, once there were four towers located in east, west, south and north of Chenzhou city, but now only south tower was left. South Tower was located in Civilized Mountain, but because South Tower became more famous than the mountain, it was called Nantaling (south tower top) instead.

South Tower was built before Northern Song Dynasty which can be approved by a poem written by Ruan Yue- one of the poets of the Northern Song Dynasty. The South Tower reserved till today was rebuilt in the eighth year of the reign of Qianlong Emperor of Qing Dynasty (AD1743). The funds were collected by Hu Xing- the officer of Chenzhou at that time. In the second year of the reign of Qianlong Emperor of Qing Dynasty, Hu Xing received many comments from local people mainly said: “many talents wrote the poems to praise the towers built in Chenzhou city, but once the towers were abandoned, seldom talent people were born in Chenzhou and people were involved in trouble times. Tower is the spirit root of Chenzhou.” Hu Xing filled regret about the comments and he sincerely hoped more talent people could be born in Chenzhou city, so he donated his salaries and called on local people to contribute on the reconstruction of South Tower. 6 years later- in the eighth year of the reign of Qianlong Emperor of Qing Dynasty, South Tower was rebuilt. In 1980, it was listed as the key culture relic protection site. In 2002, South Tower Park handled out the comprehensive maintenance and decoration of South Tower which was close to collapse. Ancient black bricks were used to repair the tower on the basis of its original appearance.

“Sunset glow of South Tower” was one of the eight old scenic spots of Chenyang. As considered by the ancient people, sunset glow was the most beautiful moment of the South Tower. Every dusk, the sunset glows on the tower body which presents beautiful poetry paint for people.

The 24.8meters high south tower is with seven floors. Its tower footing is eight square. The rolling doors are facilitated in east, south, west and north directions. The first 4 floors’ rolling doors are real, while the rest are not true. Stone stairs are set for 4th floor of the tower. Each floor is hanged with some plaques, the inscriptions of which are related with the number of floor. The fifth and sixth floors plaques are reserved, while rests are lost.

2. Traffic and geography

South Tower Park is located in the south are of old Chenzhou urban area where is about 1.5kms away from Chenzhou central urban area. It is near Luoxian ling in the north side, connected with the expanded section of Guoqing road in the west side, near Xiangxue Avenue in south side, and connected with Yuhou street in the east side. The 29.87hectares big park is a comprehensive mountain park with sound protection of cultural heritage and ecological condition.

The topography of the South Tower Park is hilly area that the southeast lope is steeper, while the northwest is gentler. The summit of the park is about 250.1meters high and the rock bottom is 176.5meters high. Three main entrances were planned to be set for this park: South entrance (which is set in Xiangxue Avenue) and west entrance (which is located in the expansion part of Guoqing road south, near South Tower Food Square) have been finished yet; and the north entrance (which is located in the junction of Jiangshanlicheng and South Tower low-renting community) is still under construction.

The park was opened to public for free. Line 2, 4, 8, 13, 24, 25, 27, 31, 51, 53 and 55 public buses would be stopped at the west or south entrance of the park. It is very convenient for citizen. Self-driving tourists can stop there as well. Driving lanes are facilitated on both south and west entrance to Chenzhou Happy World (office). 12 tourism lines with over 4100meters were facilitated in the park as well. Such convenient lines enable all visitors to enjoy their leisure time freely and happily.

3. Landscape feature

South Tower is one of the ancient buildings with sound condition reserved in Chenzhou city. It is not only with long cultural history, but also witness the changes of acient Chenzhou. It is a highlight for Chenzhou to trace its ancient history, present ancient culture, explore historical culture and upgrade connotation of city.