After two years in the making and more than 800 million yuan (US$96.3 million) in construction costs, Shanghai Science and Technology Museum will open its doors to the public on April 1.

As the city's No. 1 project for 2001, the 68,000-square-meter science land is near Century Park across from Pudong District's new administrative center.

The museum cost 300 million yuan more than the Shanghai Grand Theater. The price reflects the city government's vow that the museum will be one of the best in the world and will outclass existing science museums in Beijing and Tianjin, currently the two largest in China.

"We are in full speed to build the museum into one of the best in the world, and will be fully prepared to welcome the APEC forum," Vice Mayor Zhou Yupeng told a news conference yesterday.

Currently, 70 percent of the decoration and furnishing work has been finished. Workers are installing 500 million yuan worth of exhibits, including a digitized planetarium, at the multimedia complex.

The exhibits, mainly created by local craftsmen, will be displayed in six exhibition halls of the two-building complex. The halls are named Heaven and Earth, Life, Wisdom, Creativity, Future, and Temporary Exhibition.

In Creativity hall, the public will be able to drive virtual speedboats or yachts in a deep-water harbor, or pilot a plane.

Two theaters will have sophisticated projection systems to project three-dimensional films onto a giant domed screen using stereoscopic cinematography that makes images appear close enough to touch.

With the theme of Nature, People and Science, the museum will also feature, by means of multimedia and high-technology, a history of the human race, and the evolution of science and technology throughout history.

Other exhibits will include robots, dinosaurs fossils and a model of a magnetic levitation train.

An ancient seismograph that used to record and measure earthquakes, as well as other scientific inventions by ancient Chinese, also will be displayed.

The museum is about 10-minute drive from the Lujiazui financial district.

(Eastday.com 02/13/2001)