Complete Expo Transportation Guide (Includes Maps)

!!!UPDATED!!! The very heavily-demanded high-resolution Official Shanghai World Expo map is available for download here (front) and here (back).

There are 5 ways to beat the traffic and get to the Shanghai World Expo 2010 happy and sane.

1. If  You Drive

No parking lots for private cars are set up in the Site and its immediate vicinity. Only vehicles with Expo passes will be allowed in. To ease traffic around the Site, 31 new one-way routes can be used. Five major P+R (park and ride) lots at Shanghai International Circuit, Hongqiao Transport Hub, and Songjiang District can accomodate 10,000 cars.

2. If You Go By Taxi

Some 4,000 high-end World Expo taxis can take visitors in and out of the Expo Site, mainly through phone and online reservations. The taxis offer services to people inside the Site where private cars are offlimits. The Site is open to other taxis after 9pm.

• To reduce the traffic pressure, there is a traffic-controlled area around the Expo site, which has Luban Road, South Zhongshan Road No. 1, Guohuo Road as border in Puxi section; Yaohua Road, South Pudong Road, Nanmatou Road as border in Pudong section, covering 7 kilometers.
• Only transportation vehicles with Expo permit, Expo-designated taxis, and public buses are allowed to enter the controlled area.
• The parking lots in the controlled area are for reserved Tourist Group buses and Expo special bus lines.
• Normal taxis are allowed to enter the traffic controlled area during 21:00 to 07:00 the next day only.
• There are 4,000 Expo-designated taxis, which can enter the controlled area during the 24 hours.The taxis are in green, with paintings of China pavilion, Oriental Pearl, and Nanpu Bridge. The tires are yellow. The taxi calling number is on both sides: 96822. Press 1 for reservation, press 3 for consulting and complaining. They have English-speaking staff.
• Taxi fares: Daytime: The flag-down fare is at RMB12 for every 3 km; for the drive above 3km, RMB2.4 per kilometre; for the drive above 10km, price is RMB3.6 per kilometer. Night time (23:00-5:00): The flag-down fare is at RMB16 for every 3 km;   for the drive above 3km, RMB3.1 per kilometre; for the drive above 10km, price is RMB4.7 per kilometer. For waiting or speed lower than 12km/hour, the extra charge is: every 5 minutes equals 1km drive.

3. If You Go By Ferry

Four boarding areas, or “water gates,” on the Huangpu River enable visitors to take water vessels to the Expo. Three docks (Pudong’s Qichangzhan area, Puxi’s Shiliupu area, and Qinhuangdao Road) handle group tours. The fourth, on Pudong’s Dongchang Road, handle individual travelers.

They can serve at most 18,000 visitors per day.

The address of the four “water gates” are as follows:1 Qinhuangdao Rd
1 Qiancang Rd
1 Dongchang Rd
(serve individual travelers)

Ferry to and from Expo (click image to enlarge)

4. If You Go By Bus

Transport hubs, including the city’s two airports, two railway stations, and the international circuit, have dispatched 16 direct bus lines to the Site, to carry 15 percent of the visitor volume.Another 10 percent of visitors are expected to take 20 regular bus routes, which will provide extra services for the Expo.Authorities have also set up six shuttle bus routes, 105 runs a day, taking people in suburban areas to outlying stations of three subways: Lines 7, 8 and 9.

In neighboring cities in the Yangtze River Delta, direct bus routes set off from 19 tourism bus centers. An estimated 3,800 tourism groups will arrive per day.

Bus Lines (click images to enlarge)

• 16 direct special Expo bus lines are operated in external transport hubs and main public transport hubs, all of which directly arrive at the exlusive parking lot surrounding the entrances/exits of the Expo Pudong section.
• Except No.13 bus which sets a stop nearby Expo Avenue station, all the other bus lines head to the Expo site without stop.
• All the destination stops are within 100 meters to the Expo Entrance/Exit Gates.

• The 20 Expo bus lines (17 to 36) are based on the regular public bus lines, but adjusted to only 1-3 stops. Most of the lines have the destination stops within 100-200 meters to the Expo entrance/exit gate.

5. If You Go By Metro

Five Metro lines arrive near the Expo Site, with Line 13 taking passengers to three stations within the site: two on the Puxi side and one in Pudong. Line 13, which has three stations, runs at six-minute intervals and about three-minute intervals during peak periods.Expo ticket holders can take the trains free after security checks at the Madang Road Station, where it connects with Line 9 in Puxi. The six-carriage trains can carry 40,000 passengers per hour.Lines 4, 6, 7, 8, and 9 are expected to carry 100,000 riders per hour to nine stations near the Site during peak times. The lines run until midnight. Free shuttle buses take people between the stations and Site.

Shanghai Metro Map With Expo Entrances Overlap (click images to enlarge)

• Stations with * are transfer stations.
• There may be more free shuttle buses from stations to entrance gates later.
• There is no set fares for the metro lines. It varies according to the lines and distance, from RMB3 to RMB9 for a one-way metro trip.
• Since 24 April 2010, you can buy the one-day pass for the metro ride, which enables you to travel by metro in 24 hours unlimitedly.
• Please try to avoid the rush hours for Expo: 9:00-10:00, 17:00-19:00.
• Most metro lines operate from around 5:30 till 22:30. Please check the timetable when you are at the metro station.   The metro lines 4, 6, 7, 8, and 9 will lead directly to the 2010 Expo Garden.
• Metro Line 13 (World Expo Special Line) is for Shanghai Expo only. There are 3 stations: Madang Road, Lupu Bridge, Expo Avenue. Madang Road Station is outside Expo Garden and is a transfer station with Line 9; Lupu Bridge station is in Puxi Section and Expo.

Special lanes only for bus with Expo pass

• For buses bigger than 17-22 seaters, and/or groups of 15 pax or more, travel agencies will reserve the parking lot and entrance gates in advance; the groups should enter the site and go through the security check together, through Group Gates.

• For cars and mini-buses, individual booking of 1-14 pax, they are not allowed to enter the traffic-controlled area. If a private transfer is requested, passenger can be dropped off at Madang Road Metro station, Gate 9. You can take the Line 13 (special expo line) to enter the site. You go though the security check here, and it is free of charge with your Expo ticket.

Travel Inside The Park

Expo Site Transportation Map (click image to enlarge)

• On most occasions, visitors can get to pavilions on foot in the Expo Site.
• Since the Expo Site is divided by the Huangpu River and there is quite a distance between the zones, there is a public transport system inside the Expo which includes the metro line, bus, and cross-river ferry.

Free Bus

Visitors are able to find a shuttle bus station every 250 meters within the Expo Site, and buses roll by every minute. A total of 120 buses roll by every three minutes to take about 220,000 visitors between the Pudong and Puxi Expo sections.Another 42 shuttle buses stop along Expo Avenue on the Pudong side.On the Puxi side, there are also buses running along Longhua Road E.

Paid Bus

Besides free shuttle buses, visitors are also able to tour the grounds for a fee on eight-seat, golf cart-like vehicles. They run on the elevated pedestrian roads and have capacity to take about 10,000 visitors every day.

Ferry

Twenty-two ferry boats and 13 tour ships take visitors across the river. The boats run about 600 times per day to take 240,000 visitors.

Metro

Metro Line 13, which has three stations in the Site, runs at six-minute intervals and about three-minute intervals during peak periods.

How To Avoid Rush Hour

The following tips are given by the traffic authorities:

1. Delay your visits to the Expo site until after 10am to avoid rushhour traffic.
2. Enter the site from the five entrances in Pudong rather than the three in Puxi. This is because about 75 percent of the ticket machines are located on the Pudong side.
3. Organizers will inform the visitors which entrances have fewest people by sending short messages and displaying the information on large screens at the entrances to the site.
4. All group visitors will enter the site from Pudong.

Downloadable Expo Maps

Click on the images below to download PDF copies of the following maps:

Get a copy of the Expo Site Plan here.

SOURCES:

EXPO Shanghai Newsletter, Official EXPO map, Shanghai Metro map, and a bunch of miscellaneous facts and finds compiled.