Drugs in mail
MIND your mail, Shanghai Customs warned recently.
Carmival mood in Yangtze ballroom
FUNNY costumes and weird make-up, hugging, drinking and dancing. The specially decorated Crystal Ballroom of the Yangtze New World Hotel became a sea of some 400 revelling expatriates and local people on Saturday night.
Merger brings first exhibition JV
THE first local Sino-foreign exhibition joint venture was formed in Shanghai last week after the merger of two established exhibition services firms.
Water transport services safe for Spring Festival
SPRING Festival, which means a peak in the numbers travelling by sea, begins on Thursday and will last forty days.
Legal services market to heat up
WHILE China's imminent entry to the WTO spells a great opportunity for the development of China's legal profession, it must restructure to meet the challenges, according to a seminar sponsored recently by Shanghai-based AllBright Law Offices.
Survey:drinkable water at low ebb
LOCAL government officials are stepping up efforts to push forward a general survey of local water resources, that targets rivers, lakes and reservoirs.
Blast-hit road reopens No deaths, no injuries from gas explosion
AFTER 23 hours' hard work, repairs to the broken gas pipes which exploded on Saturday morning at the intersection of Gonghexin and Luochuandong roads was completed on Sunday morning.
4 years for date-raping 17-year-old
AN employee of Shanghai's City of Books was recently sentenced to four years' imprisonment by Pudong New Area People's Court for raping a girl last year.
A ride on the wrong side of the law
IT had to happen. As a frequent user of the city's taxi cabs I have often been able to curl a scornful lip at the poor souls who are sitting in a cab which has been pulled over by a traffic policeman. There they sit in lonely splendour while the driver - depending on the demeanour of the officer of the law and the real or alleged seriousness of the offence - either engages in much armwaving and fingerpointing, or cowers, as he, or she, fishes for licence and permit.
Trash-picker who steals bag quickly arrested
A MIGRANT woman who allegedly stole a handbag while collecting trash was recently arrested by Putuo Police on a charge of theft.
Ambitious young man dies in Germany
I REALLY don't know how I have come through these past four months. Every day when the sun rises, I long for the darkness, so that I may be shrouded in sleep. But when the night does come, I long for the day, for I cannot sleep."
Elevated rail still in track-laying stage
By Tracy Tao
CONSTRUCTION workers are laying normal track along the first phase of the city's first elevated rail, which is expected to be completed in the third quarter of this year. "Several parts of the line in Xuhui District haven't been laid with track," said Zhu Jinhai from the administration of the Preparation and Construction Office of Shanghai Urban Rail Transportation Line 3. He denied rumours in the local media that the project was soon to be completed and that several spouses of the workers had recently journeyed along the elevated rail by train. "Completion is still quite a long way off and the tour by the spouses was just a trial run along the parts that have already been completed," he said. Once normal tracks have been laid and quality is assured, "workers will lay jointless tracks," he said. "The cars imported from France will be in place in 20 or 30 months according to the contract with French partners," Zhu said. The first phase of the rail, 25 kilometres long, starts at Caohejing in Xuhui District and ends at Jiangwan Town in Hongkou District. It has 19 stations. Sixteen stations are built on the 21.5-kilometre elevated rail and the other three are on the 3.5-kilometre ground section, according to Shanghai Construction Commission. The line will cross other transport routes in five places - at Caohejing, Shanghai Stadium, Hongqiao Station, the railway station and Baoshan Station where there will be links with subways, trains and buses. The rail was built on the old downtown railway running from Shanghai to Hangzhou. The elevated rail will become part of the city's ring metro. According to the 20-year urban planning blueprint recently forwarded to the city's standing committee of People's Congress, the city will build 11 subways with a combined length of 330 kilometres and seven light rails of 130 kilometres. The blueprint will be implemented only after it receives approval from the local People's Congress and the State Council.
Copyright 2000 by Shanghai Star. All rights reserved.