Looking Down (Literally) on Shanghai

Jin Mao Tower in front and with the World Financial Center about a month ago

World Financial Center on Tuesday with the Jinmao behind

A few days ago I checked out the newly opened World Financial Center with my friend Nic, who was visiting Shanghai. I figured that having a visitor in town was just about the best time to do such a trip, as it is a little hard for me to justify spending ¥150 to go to the top of a building which I see every day on my way to and from work (I still have never made it to the Sears Tower). Despite the high price of admission to the new tower’s observation deck, the “Bottle Opener”, as it is known to some locals, is a breathtaking addition to Shanghai’s skyline.

Shanghai's Pudong area with the Huangpu river

I first saw it in 2006, when I ascended to the observation deck of the adjacent 88-story Jinmao Tower with a group from my CIEE study abroad program. At that time it was maybe two-thirds the height of the Jinmao, so it was a bit surprising to see it towering over the Jinmao when I arrived back in Shanghai this April. When I returned to the Jinmao this summer with my cousin Andrew, the “Bottle Opener” was an impressive thing to behold, rising well above the already massive and iconic Jinmao. At that time, though the exterior looked finished, much work was still being performed on the windows and interior. As we watched from the Jinmao, clouds passed through the opening in the top of the Bottle Opener and incredibly miniscule workers were lowered from cranes to complete some work on the behemoth’s mid-section.

The top of the Jinmao Tower, the Oriental Pearl Tower, the Huangpu River, and Puxi (the west bank of the river)

The observation deck finally opened this week and Nic and I decided that the WFC would be our tourist ‘activity’ for the week. We arrived via a cab that dropped us off in what appeared to be a construction site parking lot, and eventually made our way around to the shiny main entrance. There, we were first bombarded by the forced and stilted English of the tour-guides, who were seemingly selected for their jobs on purely aesthetic qualifications.

Tourists crowd the 100th floor observation deck

After about a ten minute wait in line we were able to buy our tickets in the basement staging area, and make our way to the first of about 5 lines we had to wait in to make it to the top. Thinking we were about to board an elevator to the top, we were instead treated to a psychedelic and incoherent light show involving a spinning miniature of the tower. After five wasted minutes, we took the high speed elevators up to the ninety-seventh floor. This deck was not yet at the top of the building so we made our way up to the line to get to the very top, the small deck above the space in the Bottle Opener. After a long wait for the incredibly small elevators, we finally got up to the 100th floor observation deck, which gave us an incredible view of the sprawl of Shanghai. The deck’s floors were glass, which at 474 meters, is not for the vertigo-inclined.

Walking on glass 474 meters above ground

A highlight for me was seeing workers nonchalantly taking their break on the 97th floor open deck. Altogether it was an enjoyable experience, though I look forward to returning on a less crowded day.

A couple of workers enjoy their break

Later that night, on my way home from work, I was treated to the spectacle of the Bottle Opener lit up like some type of strobe light, as seen in this video I took from the Century Avenue Metro Station.