1.
Shanghai
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Shanghai is the most populous city proper in the world, with a population of more than 24 million as of 2014. As one of the four direct-controlled municipalities of the Peoples Republic of China, it is a financial centre and transport hub. Located in the Yangtze River Delta in East China, Shanghai sits on the edge of the mouth of the Yangtze in the middle portion of the eastern Chinese coast. The municipality borders the provinces of Jiangsu and Zhejiang to the north, south and west, as a major administrative, shipping and trading city, Shanghai grew in importance in the 19th century due to trade and recognition of its favourable port location and economic potential. The city was one of five treaty ports forced open to foreign trade following the British victory over China in the First Opium War, the subsequent 1842 Treaty of Nanking and 1844 Treaty of Whampoa allowed the establishment of the Shanghai International Settlement and the French Concession. The city then flourished as a center of commerce between China and other parts of the world, and became the financial hub of the Asia-Pacific region in the 1930s. However, with the Communist Party takeover of the mainland in 1949, trade was limited to other socialist countries, and the citys global influence declined. In the 1990s, the reforms introduced by Deng Xiaoping resulted in an intense re-development of the city, aiding the return of finance. The two Chinese characters in the name are 上 and 海, together meaning Upon-the-Sea. The earliest occurrence of this dates from the 11th-century Song Dynasty, at which time there was already a river confluence. There are disputes as to exactly how the name should be understood, Shanghai is officially abbreviated 沪 in Chinese, a contraction of 沪渎, a 4th- or 5th-century Jin name for the mouth of Suzhou Creek when it was the main conduit into the ocean. This character appears on all motor vehicle license plates issued in the municipality today, another alternative name for Shanghai is Shēn or Shēnchéng, from Lord Chunshen, a third-century BC nobleman and prime minister of the state of Chu, whose fief included modern Shanghai. Sports teams and newspapers in Shanghai often use Shen in their names, such as Shanghai Shenhua F. C. Huating was another early name for Shanghai. In AD751, during the dynasty, Huating County was established at modern-day Songjiang. Today, Huating appears as the name of a hotel in the city. The city also has various nicknames in English, including Pearl of the Orient, during the Spring and Autumn period, the Shanghai area belonged to the Kingdom of Wu, which was conquered by the Kingdom of Yue, which in turn was conquered by the Kingdom of Chu. During the Warring States period, Shanghai was part of the fief of Lord Chunshen of Chu and he ordered the excavation of the Huangpu River. Its former or poetic name, the Chunshen River, gave Shanghai its nickname of Shen, two important events helped promote Shanghais development in the Ming dynasty
2.
People's Square
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Peoples Square is a large public square in the Huangpu District of Shanghai, China. It is south of Nanjing Road and north of Huaihai Road, Peoples Square is the site of Shanghais municipal government headquarters building and is used as the standard reference point for measurement of distance in the Shanghai municipality. Prior to 1949 and the establishment of the Peoples Republic of China, the Shanghai Metros Peoples Square Subway Station is an interchange among the subways Line 1, Line 2, and Line 8. Several bus stops also ring the north and south sides of the square, Peoples Park Apr.2007 Sept.2007 Oct.2007 Jan.2008 YouTube videos
3.
Geographic coordinate system
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A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system used in geography that enables every location on Earth to be specified by a set of numbers, letters or symbols. The coordinates are chosen such that one of the numbers represents a vertical position. A common choice of coordinates is latitude, longitude and elevation, to specify a location on a two-dimensional map requires a map projection. The invention of a coordinate system is generally credited to Eratosthenes of Cyrene. Ptolemy credited him with the adoption of longitude and latitude. Ptolemys 2nd-century Geography used the prime meridian but measured latitude from the equator instead. Mathematical cartography resumed in Europe following Maximus Planudes recovery of Ptolemys text a little before 1300, in 1884, the United States hosted the International Meridian Conference, attended by representatives from twenty-five nations. Twenty-two of them agreed to adopt the longitude of the Royal Observatory in Greenwich, the Dominican Republic voted against the motion, while France and Brazil abstained. France adopted Greenwich Mean Time in place of local determinations by the Paris Observatory in 1911, the latitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle between the equatorial plane and the straight line that passes through that point and through the center of the Earth. Lines joining points of the same latitude trace circles on the surface of Earth called parallels, as they are parallel to the equator, the north pole is 90° N, the south pole is 90° S. The 0° parallel of latitude is designated the equator, the plane of all geographic coordinate systems. The equator divides the globe into Northern and Southern Hemispheres, the longitude of a point on Earths surface is the angle east or west of a reference meridian to another meridian that passes through that point. All meridians are halves of great ellipses, which converge at the north and south poles, the prime meridian determines the proper Eastern and Western Hemispheres, although maps often divide these hemispheres further west in order to keep the Old World on a single side. The antipodal meridian of Greenwich is both 180°W and 180°E, the combination of these two components specifies the position of any location on the surface of Earth, without consideration of altitude or depth. The grid formed by lines of latitude and longitude is known as a graticule, the origin/zero point of this system is located in the Gulf of Guinea about 625 km south of Tema, Ghana. To completely specify a location of a feature on, in, or above Earth. Earth is not a sphere, but a shape approximating a biaxial ellipsoid. It is nearly spherical, but has an equatorial bulge making the radius at the equator about 0. 3% larger than the radius measured through the poles, the shorter axis approximately coincides with the axis of rotation
4.
Ma Chengyuan
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Ma Chengyuan was a Chinese archaeologist, epigrapher, and president of the Shanghai Museum. He was credited with saving priceless artifacts from destruction during the Cultural Revolution and he was a recipient of the John D. Rockefeller III Award, and was awarded the Legion of Honour by French President Jacques Chirac. Ma was an authority on ancient Chinese bronzes and published more than 80 books and academic papers and he was responsible for recovering ancient relics including the Jin Hou Su bells and Warring States period bamboo strips, which are now considered Chinas national treasures. Ma suffered from depression in his years, and committed suicide in September 2004. Ma Chengyuan was born in 1927 in Shanghai and he worked for the education department of the Shanghai Municipal Government before joining the Shanghai Museum in 1954. Desperate Shanghai collectors sought protection of their antiques at the Shanghai Museum, Ma initially kept the Red Guards out of the museum by organizing his employees as fake Red Guards, and protected the relics by painting Maoist slogans over the display cases. However, some of his own staff were swept by the revolutionary fervour. The extremist faction of the museum workers seized Ma along with senior officials. Trying to coerce the officials into confessing that they were traitors, Ma survived the torture, and was sent to a labour camp in Hubei province for five years. In 1972, after American President Richard Nixons historic visit to China, the Cultural Revolution ended after the death of Mao in 1976. In 1985, Ma was appointed the Director of the Shanghai Museum, when the museum was omitted from Shanghais five-year reconstruction plan in 1992, Ma lobbied Mayor Huang Ju for its rebuilding. Ma raised US$25 million by leasing the old building to a Hong Kong developer and he also made many trips abroad to solicit donations, mainly from the Shanghai diaspora who had fled to Hong Kong after the Communist revolution, raising another US$10 million. The money still ran short, but he persuaded the city government to allocate another 140 million yuan to complete the building. The museum reopened on 12 October 1996 to wide acclaim, and he won the John D. Rockefeller III Award from the Asian Cultural Council in that year. French President Jacques Chirac awarded Ma the Legion of Honour in 1998, the South China Morning Post of Hong Kong commented that Ma seemed to have willed into existence. After the opening up of China from the 1980s, tomb robbery was rampant and many artifacts were looted and smuggled across the border to Hong Kong, Ma Chengyuan was active in recovering many of the items from the Hong Kong antique market. In 1992, he purchased the 3, 000-year-old Jin Hou Su bianzhong, in 1994, Ma recovered more than 1,200 Warring States period bamboo slips from the Kingdom of Chu, now known as the Shanghai Museum bamboo slips. Several ancient texts were written on the strips, including the Kongzi Shi Lun, the discovery caused a sensation in academia, and the texts have been the subject of intense studies by numerous scholars, including Ma himself
5.
People's Square Station
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The station is reputedly the busiest metro station in all of China, handling a daily traffic of over 700,000 passengers. With the opening of the sections of Lines 12 and 13 has allowed for alternative routes around the station. The station is an interchange between Lines 1,2 and 8, making it an important interchange station boasting close to twenty exits and this combination causes it to be extremely busy during peak times, but it remains very busy during the rest of the day as well. In early 2009, a new platform for Line 8 riders heading south opened. This platform was converted from a link to Line 1. Passengers from Shiguang Road station heading south can exit from either door, Peoples Park Peoples Square Nanjing Road shopping street Fuzhou Road Shanghai Concert Hall Yanan Park Huaihai Road Taiwan Strait Tourism Association Shanghai Office
6.
Line 1, Shanghai Metro
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Line 1 is a north-south line of the Shanghai Metro network in Shanghai, China. It runs from Fujin Road in the north, via Shanghai Railway Station to Xinzhuang in the south, Line 1 serves many important points in Shanghai, including Peoples Square, a major interchange. Due to the number of important locations served, this line is extremely busy. The line is colored red on system maps, virtual Interchange with Lines 3 and 4. Peoples Square - This station serves a business and shopping area, Interchange with Lines 2 and 8. Xujiahui - This is a business and commercial area, also with tourist attractions such as the Xujiahui Cathedral, Shanghai Indoor Stadium - This station is located at the sports stadium of the same name and the biggest regional and long distance bus station in the city. Shanghai South Railway Station - This station serves the railway station of the city. Xinzhuang - The southern terminus of Line 1, interchange with Line 5, may 28,1993 - The first 4.4 km long section of the line, from Xujiahui to Shanghai South Railway Station, opens. April 10,1995 - The entire 16.1 km long line, from Shanghai Railway Station to Jinjiang Park. December 28,1996 - Separate southern section from Jinjiang Park to Xinzhuang opens, northern extension continues to operate to Shanghai Railway Station. July 1,1997 - The northern and southern sections are connected, december 28,2004 - Line runs from Gongfu Xincun - Xinzhuang after northern extension opens. December 29,2007 - Second northern extension opens, full line runs from Fujin Road - Xinzhuang
7.
Line 2, Shanghai Metro
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Line 2 is an east-west line of the Shanghai Metro network. With a length of nearly 64 km, it is the second longest line in the system after Line 11. Line 2 runs from East Xujing in the west to Pudong International Airport in the east, passing Hongqiao Airport, the Huangpu river, with a daily ridership of almost 1.5 million, it is the Shanghai Metros busiest metro line. The eastern portion of the line, from Guanglan Road to Pudong International Airport, the line is colored light green on system maps. This section, which included 12 stations, totaled 16.3 kilometres, a year later, Zhangjiang Hi-Tech Park Station was added to the eastern part of the line, adding 2.8 kilometres. Four new stations, located west of the Zhongshan Park station, opened in December 2006 and this section added 6.15 kilometres to the line. Four years later, in preparation for the 2010 Shanghai World Expo, in February, the Zhangjiang Hi-Tech Park station was rebuilt. In addition, another eastern segment took Line 2 to Guanglan Road Station, a month later, the line was extended westward to Xujing East, adding 8.0 kilometres to the line including stops at the Hongqiao International Airport and the Hongqiao Railway Station. In April, an extension added 8 stations to the line, totaling 26.6 kilometres. The renamed stations are Century Avenue, East Nanjing Road and West Nanjing Road, the line begins at East Xujing at the intersection of Xumin East Road and Zhuguang Road. The line heads northeastward under Xumin East Road for about 0.8 kilometres before veering off the road and heading east, the line then enters the interchange station serving the Shanghai Hongqiao Railway Station. This station is an interchange with Line 10, shortly thereafter, the line enters the Hongqiao Airport Terminal 2 station. Line 2 then turns northward until it meets Tianshan Road and turns east again, along this road, the line enters the Songhong Road, Beixinjing, and Weining Road stations. At the Loushanguan Road station, Line 2 veers away from Tianshan Road, the line then enters the Zhongshan Park station along Changning Road, an interchange with lines 3 and 4. The subway line runs parallel under Changning Road for a short distance before heading east under Yuyuan Road. Along Yuyuan Road, there is a station at Jiangsu Road, just before entering the West Nanjing Road station, the metro line veers away from West Nanjing Road. Line 2 comes back under the road shortly thereafter, East of the West Nanjing Road station, Line 2 heads eastward along West Nanjing Road, passing under the South-North Elevated Road. It then turns northeast into the Peoples Square station, and interchange with lines 1 and 8, East of the Peoples Square station, the subway line moves under East Nanjing Road to the East Nanjing Road station
8.
Line 8, Shanghai Metro
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Line 8 is a north-south line of the Shanghai Metro network. It runs from Shiguang Road Station, in Yangpu District to Shendu Highway Station, Shiguang Road Station — Shendu Highway Station Middle Yanji Road Station — Oriental Sports Center Station Hongkou Football Stadium - At this station, passengers can transfer to Line 3. Previously they must exit and re-enter the station, but a new linkway has been built via the shopping center, peoples Square - Passengers can interchange to Lines 1 and 2. This is also an important station, as it is located at a major financial district as well as near many tourist attractions. South Xizang Road, The first platform to platform interchange station in the Shanghai Metro network, the subway lines first phase, which opened on December 29,2007, runs between Shiguang Road Station and Yaohua Road Station, excluding Zhoujiadu Station. Trial operation began for the first phase of line on September 16. The second phase, from Yaohua Road Station to Shendu Highway Station, excluding Oriental Sports Center Station, Oriental Sports Center Station opened in April 2011. The third phase will extend Line 8 south from Shendu Highway Station to South Pujin Road and it will use rubber tire Bombardier Innova APM300 technology. On January 13 Bombardier delivered the first out of 44 autonomous people movers to Shanghai, due to the trains relatively small size and capacity compared to A size trains used on other Shanghai Metro lines the line is extremely crowded. This has caused much doubt among the public in the Shanghai Metros ability to accurately predict passenger flows for future lines. It was revealed that line 8 originally was forecasted to have a short term daily ridership of 400, 000-500,000 people/day and this is not surprising given Line 8 is planned to pass by some of Shanghais densest neighborhoods and several major attractions. However the forecast was downgraded to 200,000 people/day which allowed Shanghai Alstom, there are no short term solutions to the overcrowding. The loading gauges of A size trains are incompatible with C size trains but parallel relief bus services have started operating
9.
Shanghai Metro
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The Shanghai Metro is a rapid transit system in Shanghai, China, operating urban and suburban rail transit services to 13 of its 16 municipal districts and to Huaqiao Town, Kunshan, Jiangsu Province. Opening in 1993 with full-scale construction extending back to 1986, Shanghai Metro is the third oldest rapid transit system in China, after the Beijing Subway and the Tianjin Metro. It has seen growth, significantly during the years leading up to the 2010 Shanghai World Expo. The metro system is heavily tied with other forms of public transport in Shanghai. Currently, the Shanghai Metro system is the worlds largest rapid transit system by route length and it also ranks second in the world by annual ridership after the Beijing Subway, with 3.4 billion rides delivered in 2016. The daily ridership record was set at 11.7 million on March 20,2017, further plans to connect the Shanghai Metro with the metro systems of Suzhou and Wuxi are under active review. The first line connecting Shanghai Metro Line 11 and Suzhou Metro Line 3 is projected to be completed in 2020, ambitious expansion plans call for 25 Lines with over 1,000 km of length by 2025. By then, every location in the area of Shanghai will be within 600 meters of a subway station. May 28,1993 – Southern section of Line 1 enters operation, April 10,1995 – Line 1 enters operation. December 28,1996 – Southern extension to Line 1 enters operation, sept 20,1999 – Line 2 enters operation. December 26,2000 – The eastern extension to Line 2, november 25,2003 – Line 5 enters operation. December 28,2004 – Northern extension to Line 1 enters operation, December 31,2005 – Line 4 enters operation, except the section between Lancun Road and Damuqiao Road that was delayed due to a construction accident. December 18,2006 – Northern extension to Line 3 enters operation, December 30,2006 – Western extension to Line 2 enters operation. December 29,2007 – Five lines or sections enter operation on the day, Second northern extension to Line 1 Delayed section of Line 4. Line 6 Line 8 Line 9 December 28,2008 – Line 9 is extended from Guilin Road to Yishan Road, July 5,2009 – Southern extension to Line 8 enters operation. December 5,2009 – Line 7 enters operation, December 31,2009 – The downtown section of Line 9 and the first section of Line 11 open. February 24,2010 – Short section of extension of Line 2 enters operation. Zhangjiang Hi-tech Park station is rebuilt underground, March 16,2010 – Second western extension to Line 2 enters operation, connecting Hongqiao Airport to the metro system
10.
Simplified Chinese characters
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Simplified Chinese characters are standardized Chinese characters prescribed in the Table of General Standard Chinese Characters for use in mainland China. Along with traditional Chinese characters, it is one of the two character sets of the contemporary Chinese written language. The government of the Peoples Republic of China in mainland China has promoted them for use in printing since the 1950s and 1960s in an attempt to increase literacy and they are officially used in the Peoples Republic of China and Singapore. Traditional Chinese characters are used in Hong Kong, Macau. Overseas Chinese communities generally tend to use traditional characters, Simplified Chinese characters may be referred to by their official name above or colloquially. Strictly, the latter refers to simplifications of character structure or body, character forms that have existed for thousands of years alongside regular, Simplified character forms were created by decreasing the number of strokes and simplifying the forms of a sizable proportion of traditional Chinese characters. Some simplifications were based on popular cursive forms embodying graphic or phonetic simplifications of the traditional forms, some characters were simplified by applying regular rules, for example, by replacing all occurrences of a certain component with a simplified version of the component. Variant characters with the pronunciation and identical meaning were reduced to a single standardized character. Finally, many characters were left untouched by simplification, and are identical between the traditional and simplified Chinese orthographies. Some simplified characters are very dissimilar to and unpredictably different from traditional characters and this often leads opponents not well-versed in the method of simplification to conclude that the overall process of character simplification is also arbitrary. In reality, the methods and rules of simplification are few, on the other hand, proponents of simplification often flaunt a few choice simplified characters as ingenious inventions, when in fact these have existed for hundreds of years as ancient variants. However, the Chinese government never officially dropped its goal of further simplification in the future, in August 2009, the PRC began collecting public comments for a modified list of simplified characters. The new Table of General Standard Chinese Characters consisting of 8,105 characters was promulgated by the State Council of the Peoples Republic of China on June 5,2013, cursive written text almost always includes character simplification. Simplified forms used in print have always existed, they date back to as early as the Qin dynasty, One of the earliest proponents of character simplification was Lubi Kui, who proposed in 1909 that simplified characters should be used in education. In the years following the May Fourth Movement in 1919, many anti-imperialist Chinese intellectuals sought ways to modernise China, Traditional culture and values such as Confucianism were challenged. Soon, people in the Movement started to cite the traditional Chinese writing system as an obstacle in modernising China and it was suggested that the Chinese writing system should be either simplified or completely abolished. Fu Sinian, a leader of the May Fourth Movement, called Chinese characters the writing of ox-demons, lu Xun, a renowned Chinese author in the 20th century, stated that, If Chinese characters are not destroyed, then China will die. Recent commentators have claimed that Chinese characters were blamed for the problems in China during that time
