Since the beginning of this year, City walk has become popular on social media, attracting attention and also encountering complaints: wandering freely in the city, only clocking in does not cost money, and does not need someone to lead the way, this way of walking is no different from shopping, swinging the road, why is it popular with an English term?
What exactly is City Walk? Is it really just shopping and wandering around? In the eyes of tourism practitioners, City walk is not so simple. When it was introduced in London, England, more than half a century ago, City walk was a walking and traveling service with a theme and a professional threshold, and this definition is still the mainstream of City walk.
What exactly is the City walk out of the loop?
Eleven years ago, Annie Xu, a graduate of Shanghai Overseas Chinese University, became an inbound tour guide for a foreign-owned travel agency and began to get in touch with City Walk. At that time, after the Shanghai World Expo, there were many inbound tourists to Shanghai, and these tourists had a very strong desire to explore Shanghai. They are not satisfied with fancy tourism, but want to know more about Shanghai's urban history, culture and people's lives, and the City walk products related to it are also derived from this.
"To introduce such a product to foreign tourists, City walk is the simplest and most intuitive description for them, and has nothing to do with 'Chongyang'. Some developed cities abroad also have mature City walk lines, which they are familiar with. Xu Annie said that at that time, many foreign tourists' impression of Shanghai was still stuck in the "Ten Miles of Ocean Market" stage in the twenties and thirties of the last century, and the City walk route taken by travel agencies was mainly concentrated in the Jing'an Temple and Paramount area, in addition to explaining the stories of buildings and characters along the way, they would also let them taste fresh meat mooncakes and xiaolongbao on the street to increase the richness of the experience.
In China, City walk is better known for a global partner recruitment program launched by Qyer in 2015. The program invites global experts to be guides in their destinations, leading them on the city's characteristic routes. At that time, Annie Xu, as an overseas route designer for Qyer.com, had traveled to Chiang Mai in Thailand, Tokyo and Kyoto in Japan to design routes. Many of the tourists participating in these global routes are from China. This has also shifted City walk from mainly receiving inbound tourists to a wider customer base.
Annie Xu (first from left) walks with tourists in Shanghai. Photo courtesy of interviewee
Although City walk can be literally translated as "city walk" or "city walk", Zhou Weihong, deputy general manager of Spring and Autumn Tourism, believes that this kind of "walk" is not a personal casual wandering, nor is it a roar to check in everywhere, but with the theme, several people or a group of people follow a professional leader and tour guide to go deep into the city's neighborhoods to have a deeper and systematic understanding of the history, culture and life of the city or a certain area. "In the travel world, City walk is widely regarded as a type of travel product and service that can be attended by tourists from afar or local residents. Through the City Walk, you can not only understand the past but also perceive the present, which is one of the ways to experience the closest to the city. ”
When tracing the origins of City Walk, the "originator" of this walking method, LondonWalks, has to be mentioned. More than 50 years ago, London Walk launched a City walk in London with a variety of themes.
Open its homepage and a variety of themed walks appear prominently on the homepage: "Legal London" tour with lawyers as guides, "Medical London" tour with professional doctors, "London Urban Geology" tour led by university geologists, "Shakespeare in London" tour led by well-known troupe actors, "London Rock 'n' Roll" tour led by musicians... According to rough statistics, there are more than 20 walking routes with various themes, and almost all people with different interests can find corresponding theme routes. Prices for these London walks are also transparent: €15 for adults, €10 for a companion and €5 for children.
A number of city walks are listed on the London Walk company homepage. Screencast
After studying the route setting of London Walks, combined with his own practice in recent years, Zhu Yining, the founder of "Heart City", which specializes in Shanghai city walking, believes that City walk is a kind of walking with a professional threshold, and everyone can open and explore different perspectives of the city through different ways. Therefore, City walk organizers need to have sufficient knowledge and accumulation in a certain professional field in order to deliver high-quality output to line participants.
Why is Shanghai's City walk so popular?
This year, City walk has attracted such a high level of attention, thanks to the boost of social media platforms, and Shanghai has become one of the top cities in the popularity of City walk. In fact, before the social platform was widely concerned, City walk had accumulated and developed in Shanghai for nearly a decade.
In 2013, Annie Xu's travel agency launched the Shanghai City Walk on Ctrip's platform, expanding the city walking method from inbound tourists to domestic tourists for the first time. To entice people to experience this new thing, these City Walks are priced at just $28, which is the same price as a cup of coffee. Xu Annie remembers that almost all of the people who came to the event were Shanghai locals, and they could walk seven or eight groups in two days on weekends, with a total of about 160 people. This also means that City walk has a good mass base in Shanghai.
In 2015, after Airbnb officially entered the Chinese market, it gave great traffic support to the first domestic city city walk lines, and a group of City walk entrepreneurs relying on this platform emerged. In Shanghai, many City walk entrepreneurs are committed to the discovery and design of urban architecture, art, humanities and history, many of which support bilingual explanations in Chinese and English, and the price is about 158 yuan to 200 yuan per person. In addition to homestays, this type of City walk has also become the main category of the Airbnb platform.
Tourists who participated in the City walk route organized by "Heart City" became a beautiful scenery on the streets of Shanghai. Photo courtesy of interviewee
During the three-year epidemic, outbound travel and long-distance travel were blocked, and the City walk, which had accumulated over the years, was finally out of the loop. Talking about the popularity of City walk in Shanghai, many industry insiders said that Shanghai's developed public transportation network, good pedestrian and cycling road facilities, and the inclusiveness and openness of Shanghai culture are the basis of City walk's popularity.
"Shanghai is a city where you can see, play, stop, and rest, and the points worth admiring are also relatively concentrated, which is very suitable for City walk." Zhou Weihong said. In 2020 and beyond, the public shorelines along the Huangpu River and Suzhou Creek will be opened one after another, and "buildings can be read, streets can be strolled, and cities have temperature" has become everyone's consensus, which has boosted the development of City walk in Shanghai.
Walking in Shanghai all year round, Annie Xu also mentioned a detail. "Ten years ago, walking on the streets of Shanghai, I would encounter construction sites from time to time, and it was easy to 'eat ash'; there were not so many public toilets along the way, so I did not dare to drink water. Now, these are almost no problem, and the overall pedestrian environment in Shanghai has improved significantly. At the same time, the attraction points of Shanghai's streets have gradually been connected into lines in urban renewal from scattered points in the early years, and then further connected into districts. In such a big environment, even if you wander aimlessly on the streets, you can have a good experience.
Zhu Yining believes that the more important reason for the rise of City walk in Shanghai is that the city's economic development level matches it. In international metropolises such as London, New York and Paris, City walks are already routine. "In China, if the citizens of a city are to start to be willing to spend more time, energy and money on culture, Shanghai must be a leader. After the economy reaches a certain level, it will begin to attach importance to culture, and the foundation of the existence of so many museums, art galleries and theatrical performances in Shanghai is also here. ”
In addition, Shanghai is a metropolis with excellent climate and geographical conditions, where many major historical events have occurred at home and abroad in the past hundred years, making different areas of the city present their own characteristics and become an inexhaustible treasure trove of City walk. "For example, Shanghai's Hongkou District, where literati gathered, Mr. Lu Xun left many footprints there; Almost every historical building on the Bund has a unique attraction, and the factories and warehouses along the Suzhou Creek have gained new vitality after being revitalized; The narrow road is full of small shops in the 'Wutong District', and a new generation of people are creating new stories here..."
Tourists participating in the "Architecture Can Read" theme route check in on the banks of Suzhou River. Profile picture
Nowadays, among the City walk crowd on the streets of Shanghai, there are not only individual tourists who check in freely, but also tourism practitioners who focus on this field, and some folk experts in architecture, music, art and other fields regularly meet with the crowd to start a pure public welfare theme walk, presenting a situation of a hundred flowers blooming.
Taking the Four Elements Warehouse City Walk launched by "Heart City" as an example, before leading everyone into the building, the staff will first explain the ins and outs of the Four Elements Warehouse defense battle through a large number of historical materials. Why was the Sihang Warehouse the last fortress captured by the Japanese army in Shanghai at that time? Why didn't Japan bombard warehouses with more direct artillery? A four-line topographic map of the warehouse on an old map illustrates these problems.
Historical data is more paper knowledge, how to prove that those things actually happened? Zhu Yining and his colleagues began the long road of "using material evidence for history" and began to collect all kinds of old objects that could corroborate with historical materials. A badge, an old bag, an old bill, they may all consider them a "treasure". In Zhu Yining's office, various old objects occupy more space than the space of employees.
He took out a framed yellowed note and recounted the mystery with interest: "The four lines of the four-line warehouse refer to Yanye Bank, Jincheng Bank, Zhongnan Bank, and Mainland Bank, and this note is a receipt issued by the joint trust of these four banks, with the logo of 'four lines' and the word 'JOINTTRUST' on the top, the latter is the meaning of joint trust." On this receipt with the words "3.96 million yuan," Zhu Yining also noticed "No. 170 Nanjing West Road" and the faint English words "International Hotel." Today, 170 West Nanjing Road is still an international hotel, and this 1948 note is not only proof of the existence of the Four Elements United Trust, but also reveals the traces of the high-end customers who came to the international hotel in those years.
Four-line joint trust old notes
Zhu Yining told the mystery on an old packaging bag with the words "glass radio". Photo by Li Baohua
Could Shanghai's City walk be better?
In the face of controversies such as "Chongyang" and "high-end" faced by City Walk, tourism practitioners have different attitudes. Some people think that the growth of new things will always experience doubt, and more attention can make it develop healthier; There are also people who shy away, "the word is a little rotten now, I don't want to talk about it publicly" ... But the consensus is that high-quality City walk products are one of the best ways to spread urban culture.
Having led many tourists at home and abroad to walk in Shanghai, Annie Xu cherishes the popularity and mass base of the current City Walk. She said that through the City walk, old Shanghainese can re-understand the city they live in, and new Shanghainese can better integrate, and everyone will have a greater sense of belonging to the city in the process.
For example, when everyone walks together in Xuhui's Hengfu Style District, the old Shanghai is often most interested in historical buildings and the stories of big families in those years, while the cafes, restaurants, fashion brands, etc. distributed in the style area are often the main participants of new Shanghainese. When the old and new generations of Shanghainese walk on the same City walk route, different points of interest will allow them to break each other's cognitive boundaries, and will also communicate with each other during the itinerary to achieve the collision and integration of people and ideas. Annie Xu said that she also likes to "brush the street" very much. "Instead of browsing a lot of negative information online, go shopping. As long as I walk on the road and see so many people working hard to do business, trying to create joy and beauty, and others trying to spend money, this positive attitude and emotions will infect me and make people optimistic! ”
Sun Guoying, winner of the bronze award of the National Tour Guide Competition, led tourists to walk the Yangpu Riverside. Profile picture
In St. Petersburg, Russia, Zhu Yining participated in an unforgettable City Walk with the theme of Rooftop Walk - A Rooftop Walk. With a bunch of keys, the organizers open the door of the house at the beginning of the route, take the participating tourists up to the roof, explain the surrounding architecture and cultural history of the city, and finally enjoy the sunset together. Amazingly, the roofs of more than a dozen houses that visitors pass by are all connected together, and the whole trip is full of challenges and novelty to walk on the rooftops of the city. Locally, it's a popular and established City walk line. In Japan, there are also city walk routes that drive go-karts to explore the city. He hopes that in the future, Shanghai's City walk can also have more walking styles and more open public spaces, so as to open up people's imagination of the city.
For tourism practitioners, a casual stroll is certainly a way to open up the city, but it should not be equated with the City walk. "The essence of the City walk is actually twofold, one is the continuity of culture, and the other is the continuous creation of life, we need to make the urban culture move forward more sustainably in the 'warm and new knowledge'." Zhu Yining said. Annie Xu proposed that she hopes that the imported product of City walk will emphasize more culture, emotions and a sense of belonging, and in the future, more professionals will stand up to tell stories and knowledge in a certain professional field, polish the "diamond" of Shanghai from different perspectives, and let her shine from more angles.
Source: Author: Li Baohua