KEY POINTS:
Beijing, a city teeming with 14 million people, wants to show it is a great capital and shed its reputation as a terribly polluted city.
Chinese Society of Landscape Architects president Zhou Ganzhi said next year's Olympics would become the model for future "green Olympics".
The pivotal feature
of Beijing's plans is the 680ha Olympic Forest Park, which will include 530,000 trees and a large man-made lake fed by recycled water from wetlands fed from the city's sewage system.
"What we have done in Beijing is unprecedented," Zhou Ganzhi said at the world landscape architects' summit meeting in Beijing.
"The greening of the park and the city are more important than building projects because they are more important for Beijing.
"We are going to build a green city and enhance Beijing to a new level in the years to come, which will benefit people's health and environment in this city.
"We know that people focus on climate change and that global warming leads to a change in our environment. Floods and droughts will become more serious, and China is not immune to climate change.
"It is estimated by many experts in the world that in maybe the next 100 years the weather will have serious impact on human life, and this is the most important issue in the world today."
The Forest Park, designed by Chinese architects from Tsinghua University, will be a main feature of the greening approach. The Olympic zone covers 1215ha near the centre of Beijing, and 32 of the 37 Olympic sports will be held in the city.
A professor at Tsinghua University says the capital has seen huge changes in seven years. Few cars were on the roads unless they were government vehicles and those driven by the very rich.
Today, Beijing is choking with dense traffic. The city has nearly three million cars - a tally estimated to be increasing by 1110 a day.
Not long ago they had lanes just for rickshaws, three-wheelers and bikes. Now they have lanes for bikes, buses and cars.
The congestion and traffic is manic. The common phrase from taxi drivers is "Che tai duo le" - too many cars.
During the African Leaders' Congress in Beijing last year the city leaders required most government vehicles, which still make up a big chunk of those on the road, to stay off the roads.
Dedicated traffic lanes on key routes were created, and the city plans to repeat and expand this for the Olympics.
The rest of the infrastructure is in place. Most of the buildings are almost finished.
Landscaping has begun and an endless supply of trees seems to be available.
The jewel in the Olympic crown is the National Stadium, called the Bird's Nest because of its inter-woven colour-steel lattice of girders.
You see a line of workers stroll out of the Bird's Nest construction smoko cabins, pick up their ancient wooden carts, picks and shovels, and head back to the site.
It seems modern Beijing was dug largely by pick and shovel wielded by swarms of workers guided by architects from Europe.
The light rail line from the airport was built last year at an enviable pace.
The road that crosses part of the airport expressway near the toll gate seems to have gone up since winter.
Professor Xiaoming Liu, of Tsinghua University, says Beijing used to have a policy of fast progress. Now it is "fast but better".
Kiwi Alex McKinnon, an investment manager for Mahon China in Beijing for five years, said its command economy "can effect such efficient executive action, and Beijing will surely host a successful performance in 2008; with some incredible structures as backdrops".
Some in Beijing say that the sign of progress is the bulldozer's blade. But the demolition of the quaint old hutongs, the little houses which once dominated the ancient city, is a controversial issue.
In a city of dazzling new skyscrapers, and manicured inner-city tree-lined boulevards, the hutongs are a fading reminder of the old way and grinding poverty.
The hutongs have been flattened to make way for shopping, subway stations and new streets. They used to account for a third of Beijing's urban area.
