The drone training centre has everything a budding pilot needs: an open field for mastering the basics,
an obstacle course for refining precision and computers for learning to program distant flights.
But its most important feature is where it is.
This month Beijing banned drone sales within the city because of security concerns.
The Shenghang centre is across the border in Hebei province, where restrictions are looser.
"Activity is beginning to move out here," says Bai Jiantong, its director.
Looser, though, does not mean loose.
Every morning the school checks with air-traffic control whether its drones can fly.
Its permitted airspace extends upwards exactly 50 metres.
And its students must train for nearly three months and pass a tough test before receiving certification.
China's effort to corral its drones mirrors a debate now consuming officials the world over:
how tightly to grip a technology before it runs wild.
The dilemma—enough freedom for innovation, enough control to prevent disaster—
is the central regulatory challenge of the age,
repeated across autonomous driving, artificial intelligence and much else.
China's approach matters, because in many of these fields it is at or near the frontier.
Confusingly, two opposing narratives dominate discussions about China's tech regulations.
One is that it is unusually permissive:
an under-developed legal system means companies are not bound by red tape;
local governments vie for investment by letting entrepreneurs experiment;