Yet another nail-house (钉子户) confrontation involving angry residents and anti-government banners took place recently in Guangzhou, though at least this time it all ended happily. On September 6th, 2011, Yao Runzhen (姚润珍) engaged in a heated negotiation with housing officials, protesting against their eviction and refusing to move, despite the reality of their neighborhood turning into rubble and fine dust. After a successful negotiation involving a satisfactory compensation package however, the couple willingly backs down, while the "Good Life" (好生) demolition company tears down their abode. more ›

After some hard calculations from 50 industrial experts and months long studies, a group of political advisors have come up with the newfangled idea that quality of life should guide Shanghai's development into the future. Apparently, the idea of looking beyond GDP as the sole indicator of a city's "happiness" deserves a long feature in The Global Times. more ›

The World Expo draws to a close in less than a month and Shanghai urban planning officials seek to turn the space into yet another busy city hub chock full of, not surprisingly, ritzy malls and high rise apartments. more ›

Not too surprising, we suppose. They broke ground on this at the expo site today, More from the Shanghai Daily: more ›

Shanghaiist headed out to the city government on Wednesday morning to check out what was happening with the housing protester folks, who go there every Wednesday to meet with officials in hopes of solving their cases. It's been several months since we last reported on these folks, and nothing much seems to have changed. There are still of plenty of pissed off people. Wary of making too much of an impression on the guards over there, we talked briefly with some people and then headed next door, to the Shanghai Urban Planning and Exhibition Center, where they opened the The Blacksmiths' Alchemy exhibition. In case you missed it, here's a blurb: more ›

According to a recent report by Beijing's International Institute for Urban Development, Shanghai ranks third among Chinese cities in quality of life. The "key factors" used to concoct this study were not published, but with four of the top 10 cities located in malarial Guangdong province (first-place Shenzhen literally translates to "deep irrigation ditch", while Dongguan has been called the armpit of China), we can be fairly certain that the first "key factor" was the size of each city's contribution to the IUD. Shanghaiist won't completely dismiss the study, though, since it correctly ranks Shanghai above Beijing (fourth). more ›

Shanghaiist has just had the dubious pleasure of experiencing Guangzhou rush hour -- and even now, hours later, we still reek of eau de exhaust. So imagine how thrilled we were to hear that Dongtan (东滩) Chongming Island (崇明岛) right off Shanghai at the mouth of the Yangtze River, is going to become the site of the world's first eco-city. Here's an excerpt from the press release. more ›

On the heels of the recent forced-eviction protests in front of Shanghai's Portman Ritz-Carlton comes news that two city real estate agents were sentenced to death for torching the homes of residents who refused to abandon their neighborhoods in 2004 and 2005. One of the acts of arson killed an elderly couple back in January. more ›