Shanghai’s main sights closed to tourists
Expo 2010 opens on May 1 and runs until October 31. These six months will see over 200 countries and international organizations talk about their achievements under the exhibition’s motto: “Better City, Better Life”.
Expo 2010 opens on May 1 and runs until October 31. These six months will see over 200 countries and international organizations talk about their achievements under the exhibition’s motto: “Better City, Better Life”.
Whether or not Shanghai has improved in the run-up to Expo 2010 is a question that all its residents, and there are over 18 million of them, daily seek to answer. It is also a question that those visiting will be able to answer once the exhibition opens. Over 70 million people are expected to visit Expo 2010. Both the national and city authorities are confronted by the task of turning “old Shanghai” into a modern, convenient and environment-friendly city, on a tight timescale.
International Labor Day on May 1st is an official day-off in China, and will be the first day of rest for many who are toiling away at this year’s Expo 2010. All the work on preparing the city has to be finished by then.
“We work ten hours a day, some work daytime, and others work nights. We must complete the work on time,” worker Yang Xiaobao told a RIA Novosti correspondent. Alongside hundreds of his co-workers he is renovating the pavement of a street in downtown Shanghai. They are paid 3,000 Yuan, or $440, a month for their hard labor, which is a relatively high salary for Chinese construction workers. Workers from all over China have arrived in Shanghai just as they flooded into Beijing during the Olympic preparations.
The construction work on Expo Park is also carried out round the clock. China was the first to announce that it had finished building its pavilion. The other 48 countries that are constructing their own pavilions promise they will finish on time. The city administration has promised likewise. Almost all Shanghai’s main sights are currently closed to tourists: they are all part of a colossal construction site. Flowers are being planted on the embankment, the Pearl Ring, which serves as a pedestrian overpass at a busy crossing, is being built by the TV tower. The work is being carried out all day long and even at night.
As China becomes increasingly wealthy and the Chinese start buying more cars, traffic jams have become an integral part of urban life in this country. Shanghai, where living standards are rather high, is no exception. Besides, Shanghai, unlike the Chinese capital, has many narrow and winding streets which are not the best environment for traffic.
The subway is a completely different story. The Shanghai Metro is developing intensively in the run-up to Expo 2010: two new lines were commissioned on the New Year’s Eve, bringing the metro lines’ total length to over 340 kilometers. In addition to those ten lines another one will be launched soon and existing lines will be extended.
“The Expo is, without a doubt, a powerful development stimulus for Shanghai but we also feel that, first, police control has been tightened, especially for foreigners, and, second, that the life is getting more expensive,” U Taiwan from Thailand, who has lived in China for over ten years, told a RIA Novosti correspondent.
As life becomes more expensive across China, real estate prices in Shanghai are in a world away from those in other cities, including Beijing. A square meter in a new house in Shanghai currently costs about 25,500 Yuan, or $3,700, but in fact, in many prestigious districts, prices already exceed that. Housing in a skyscraper along the Huangpu River in Shanghai’s Pudong district costs more than 50,000 Yuan, or $7,400, per square meter, and prices in the downtown exceed 100,000 Yuan, or $15,000.China’s leadership is currently searching for a way to tame this price growth in real estate but they have not found it yet.
Hotel prices are also rising. However, you can avoid these problems by starting your search for accommodation early. It is still possible to find a decent hotel in Shanghai with rooms costing 450 Yuan, $66, or even less.
China announced that it will spend $4.5 billion on the Expo. How much the exhibition will eventually cost the country is most likely to be announced afterwards, in Chinese Olympic tradition.
The opinions expressed in this article are the author’s and do not necessarily represent those of RIA Novosti.
SHANGHAI. (RIA Novosti correspondent Maria Chaplygina)