Shanghai Urban Planning Exhibition Hall

Lonely Planet review

Urban Planning Exhibition Halls - where the creaking cities of yore are triumphantly redesigned by developers into fabulous metropolitan visions - are all the rage in New China (Běijīng has one). It's pitched as a tourist attraction, but this is really just a massively optimistic self-appraisal. Most Western visitors are in town to see how the city used to be rather than how it may be.

The diorama of the Shanghai of the future on the third floor is worth a circuit, while the brilliant (albeit self-congratulating) Virtual World 3-D wraparound tour of Shanghai is a dizzying computer simulated tour. Balancing it all out are photos of 1930s Shanghai and historic maps, and topping it all is a café and observation lounge. Exit the building through a basement street of mock 1930s cafés.