People’s Square & People’s Park

The civic centre of Shanghai, and until 1949 the racecourse — the park and the square together occupy the old track, which is why the street pattern around them bulges into an oval.

The Shanghai Museum, the Grand Theatre and the Urban Planning Exhibition Centre all stand on it, and the park behind is one of the few large green spaces in the centre.

What it costs

⭐ Free, and so is the park.

⭐ The Urban Planning Exhibition Centre holds an enormous scale model of the entire city, which is the single best way to understand Shanghai’s shape before you walk it. Small admission, and worth it on your first day rather than your last.

When to go

⭐ Weekend mornings, for the marriage market. Parents gather in one corner of People’s Park with printed advertisements for their unmarried adult children — age, height, income, apartment, hukou — pegged to umbrellas and railings. It is entirely public, it has been running for two decades, and it is the most revealing hour you can spend in Shanghai.

⚠️ Watch, do not photograph faces. The parents are there reluctantly and mostly without their children’s knowledge.

Getting there

People’s Square station, lines 1, 2 and 8. ⚠️ It is a very large interchange with many exits spread over several hundred metres — check the exit number for where you actually want to come up.

If you only have an hour

The park first, then the Urban Planning Centre, then the museum if you have booked it. That order works because the model shows you the city and the museum shows you what was there before it.

What people get wrong

Using it only as an interchange. Most visitors pass under this square several times and never come up into it.