Okay, it may be the case that we don't fly enough, but yesterday at the Hongqiao Airport, we were really surprised to see this Virgin bookstore at the departure hall (that Richard Branson has really acted fast, hasn't he?). Does anyone know how long the store has been there? Food and beverage options appear to have widened up quite a bit too. Element Fresh has been there since last summer, located just outside the exit......

There has been plenty of criticism leveled at the Shanghai subway system, both on Shanghaiist and elsewhere, for things that could be better about it: it closes too early, the interchanges take too long, it's too crowded and too hot/cold, it doesn't reach XXX place, etc. If you fancy yourself on optimistic person, though, you know that one way to change the negatives into positives is to change your complaints into things you're looking forward......

From Shanghai Daily:SHANGHAI issued an orange alert for heavy fog this morning. It was the first orange fog warning since winter began early this month. The Shanghai Meteorological Bureau issued a yellow alert for fog at 1am and upgraded it to orange about 5am. The alert was lowered at 10am this morning. Four international flights, with a total of 835 passengers, were diverted from Pudong International Airport and landed at Hongqiao Airport due to heavy......

By Julien Bertrand: On his first official visit to China, French President Nicolas Sarkozy must have been dizzy, witnessing the signing of contracts worth 20 billion euros in total, comprising of 160 Airbus aircrafts, two EPR nuclear reactors (to be built in Taishan, Guangdong, by 2014) and signal equipment for Shanghai’s future 36-kilometer metro line #10, a long-awaited deal between Alstom and Shanghai Metro that will link New Jiangwan Town to Hongqiao Airport. In an......

Woohoo! It looks like a Beijing-Shanghai high-speed railway is coming our way soon that will cut travelling time from 13 hours to under five hours! Shanghaiist can't wait! This will undoubtedly give those darned Beijing-Shanghai "air express services" a run for their money! In other travel news, ANA will commence a code-sharing agreement with Shanghai Airlines and Air China on flights operated by ANA and Shanghai Airlines between Tokyo's Haneda Airport and Shanghai's Hongqiao......

Two bits of transportation news from random sources: The Xinmin Evening Post reports that the Shanghai Pudong Airport Authority and the Shanghai Mapping Institute will be making free maps of the city available in special racks at the Pudong Airport starting this week, with plans to expand to Hongqiao Airport and the Shanghai Railway Station. The map is the standard Chinese map of Shanghai that you can buy for RMB 6 at bookstores throughout the......

We have whined before about the dearth of decent restaurants in Shanghai's airports. Pudong travelers are still better off brown-bagging it, but it seems relief will soon be on the way for domestic travelers: Element Fresh is opening up shop at Hongqiao Airport. From their website: Element Fresh Express coming to Hong Qiao airport in July! Finally there is an alternative to airline food & drinks: the Express will offer fresh juices, smoothies and coffee......

It was reported this weekend that the much ballyhooed 25-minutes-from-Shanghai-to-Hangzhou maglev train, which was supposed to be fully operational around 2010, has been delayed. Indefinitely. Which makes us ask, how much longer are we going to have to wait to be ushered into the sci-fi utopia of the 21st century that we spent most of the 20th century dreaming about? Speculation abounds as to what happened. China Herald that the purported concerns of people affected......

Have China Scholars All Been Bought? "Academics who study China, which includes the author, habitually please the Chinese Communist Party, sometimes consciously, and often unconsciously. " Cartoon police to 'patrol' all Web sites in China "China plans to expand its use of animated police figures into a virtual force symbolizing the government's monitoring of all major Web sites and online forums, state media said Saturday." Eating Human Fetuses in China "The story was about......

This morning, Chinese language news portal 163.com had a great scoop, and revealed the future planning for Shanghai and China's Maglev railway system. Shanghaiist's Chinese ability is sadly limited, but using the new-fangled internet technology we reported on earlier this week, we were able to get the gist of the 163.com article. The article reveals that the current 30km long section of the Pudong Airport-Longyang Road Maglev line will be extended to eventually form a......

Yesterday, we read with interest a few news stories about the approval of a 15.3 billion yuan (US$1.9 billion) expansion of the Hongqiao Airport. By 2010 (of course) there should be a new runway, a new 250,000 square meter terminal, and access to high-speed trains, inter-city trains and subways all at the airport. This all sounds great: Shanghai's most conveniently located airport gets even more convenient (hopefully they do something about the long taxi lines,......

Lots of juicy transportation news today: A new displacement order has been released by the Xujiahui Housing, Land and Resource Administration Bureau which is likely related to work on an extension of the Maglev to Hongqiao Airport.At the ongoing Shanghai People's Congress, representative Lei Guofen submitted a proposal asking that the commercial advertisements after stop names announced on metro cars (including the ubiquitous and therefore infamous Christine Bakery) be replaced by announcments of "public and......

The airport was Hongqiao, not Pudong. And, yes, the airline was China Eastern. This happened yesterday afternoon at 2:09, when a Boeing 737-300 was arriving from Qingdao. None of the roughly 100 passengers on board was reported injured in the accident — passengers and luggage were evacuated from the aircraft in around 30 minutes — but Hongqiao Aiport, the city's main hub for domestic flights, was closed and normal operations didn't resume there until 6:45......

Shanghaiist is neither fashionable nor interested in fashion, but we know a good party when we hear of one. Which is why we held on to the three invitations that landed on our desk for the opening of the Giorgio Armani Retrospective at the Shanghai Art Museum, a Giorgio Armani fashion show in the Shanghai Grand Theatre, and a Vogue China after-party at Three on the Bund, all on Saturday night. You’re probably asking: how......

If you choose to undergo the necessary procedures for hiring a car, or even easier, borrowing a friends, then where to go? The best places for day trips around Shanghai are Hangzhou, Suzhou, Yangcheng Lake (in Suzhou) and Zhouzhuang. Yangcheng lake is a very popular day-trip for the locals, as the lake is famous for its delicious crabs. Go in October to December for the best crabs. To drive there, you just need to get......

Shanghai finally has an answer to Okay Airlines! The first of Shanghai Spring Airlines' Airbus 320s arrived at Hongqiao Airport earlier this week, and the budget airline expects its first flight to Shandong Province's Yantai to leave on July 18. The China Daily makes it seem as though Yantai is the only destination Shanghai Spring currently has permission to fly. Ever since China announced the gradual privatization of its airline industry earlier this year, it......