Beijing Urban Planning Museum

The Beijing Planning Exhibition Hall introduces the long history of Beijing, displays current condition, and exhibits the wonderful future plans of Beijing's urban development. The huge scale of the museum has large open spaces, 4 floors, and 8,000 square meters of exhibits.

On the second floor, next to the escalators, is a bronze relief sculpture - The Old City of Beijing. It is a 10-meter high and 9-meter wide (1:1,000) scale model of 1949 Beijing. The sculpture has more than 118,000 houses and 60,000 trees and a large number of alleys, lakes and rivers.

The third floor features the evolution of traditional Beijing with photos, old maps, wells, gates and columns from past dynasties. There are models of old courtyard houses and their gateways. The transformation of Beijing is traced from its origins to the modern capital today.

On the forth floor there is a widescreen 3-D film cinema The films require an additional ticket price in addition to the gate entrance fee but were enjoyable (if short). There are two films:

1. The Immortal City, a 10-minute film about the 850-year history of Beijing as a capital city. The film provided a good introduction to the cities development and might be a good start to your visit of the museum as they help get you motivated and interested in the history on the third floor.
2. The New Beijing, a 3-D film lasting about 6 minutes, features current achievements and future plans for the city as it prepares for the Olympics in 2008. You have to wear funky 3-D glasses for this one but it is worth it. It is amazing how much changes are in the works for Beijing. A dozen subway lines, cutting edge skyscrapers, more parks, and of course the Olympic site. The pace of development is unlike any other country in the world. As this film proves, you shouldn't wait to visit China. If you wait five years it will look totally different from today! More importantly, it is the process of change that makes Beijing such an exciting travel destination.

There is a huge model of Beijing as it will be in 2008 in the museum that is visible from two floors. It is the museum's highlight and something that should be explored. Bring your tourist map and guidebook. Use this model to pick out the places you visited as well as where you will head to next. It gives you a great idea of where things are in relation to one another.

The museum isn't exciting because of its exhibits. Beijing's changes makes this a place to visit - to ponder what was and what will be for this fantastic city.