Looking back at the people who helped build Pudong

People line up to make calls at a public phone booth in Pudong in 2002. In the background is Jin Mao Tower. Completed in 1998, it was the highest building at the time.

A white-collar worker walks past high-rises in Lujiazui on June 11, 2002. As the main birthplace of the modern financial industry in China, the Pudong New Area has seen the booming development of its financial sector. In 2019, the added value of its financial industry reached 383.5 billion yuan (US$57.6 billion), accounting for around a third of the area’s GDP and more than half of the added value made by Shanghai's financial space.

Workers gather at a launch ceremony of the expansion of the Pudong International Airport on December 12, 2005. The construction of the Phase 4 project of the airport started this year and a Metro line will be connecting the Hongqiao and Pudong transportation hubs.

A group of student from Yangjing Experimental Primary School are attracted by a video phone at a telecoms demonstration hall in Puodng on July 21, 2005. 

Workers constructing the Shanghai World Financial Center get off work on February 14, 2006. The 474-meter structure was finished in 2008 as the tallest building in Shanghai at the time. 

Young men seeking jobs wait outside the first Wal-Mart store opening in Shanghai on July 13, 2005 in Pudong. So far, Wal-Mart has partnered with many delivery platforms to reach a wider customer base.

A senior lady from Huamu Community studies English on March 10, 2006 in preparation for the World Expo 2010 Shanghai. 

A dancer performs on December 10, 2006 as the second phase of Yangshan Deep-Water Port was completed. Shanghai currently is among the biggest container outlets in the world, with an annual throughput of 40 million TEU (20-foot equivalent unit), and a single-month figure of over 4 million TEU last month.

Commuters get off a Huangpu River ferry at the South Wharf in Pudong on October 15, 2006. Ferries used to be the only public means of crossing the river in the 1980s. Many tourists still chose ferries as an economical way to view the sights of Lujiazui and the Bund.

Local police officials and athletes of the Special Olympic Games participate in a torch relay on September 29, 2007 in Pudong. Nearly 11,000 athletes and coaches from 163 countries and regions took part in the Games in Shanghai that year.  

Workers welds iron bars for a tunnel crossing the Huangpu River in Gaoqiao Town on December 26, 2008. Shanghai currently has 16 tunnels and 12 bridges crossing the Huangpu River.

Residents take photos in front of the China Pavilion at a construction site of the World Expo Shanghai on February 17, 2010. About 240 countries and regions took part in the event that year and more than 73 million people visited the Expo site.

After a 60-hour non-stop effort by more than 500 workers, the base concrete casting of about 61,000 cubic meters for Shanghai Tower was finished on March 28, 2010. With a height of 580 meters, the building which was finished in 2015 remains the highest in Shanghai.

Two interviewees at a job fair for German enterprises in Pudong on March 18, 2011. 

A villager stands by dismantled buildings in Zhaohang Town on January 7, 2011 in Pudong, where the Shanghai Disney Resort was planned. The resort opened to the public five years later in 2016. 

The first batch of students from New York University Shanghai dance on August 25, 2013. The university was co-established by East China Normal University and New York University as the world’s first Sino-US university in Pudong in 2012.

A worker handles a parcel on November 29, 2013 at the DHL warehouse at Pudong Airport Free Trade Zone, which was part of the Shanghai free trade zone set up in September 2013. China’s State Council recently approved the “one permit for one industry” project for market access in Pudong to deepen reform of the Shanghai free trade zone.

Pudong Library is occupied with book lovers on July 23, 2017. 

Residents of Xinchang Village in Pudong make traditional zongzi on May 30, 2018 before the Dragon Boat Festival. The century-old watertown is linking with 10 others in the neighboring provinces of Jiangsu and Zhejiang, hoping to be placed on the UNESCO list of World Cultural Heritage Sites.

Pakistani expat Aiza Kashif patrols a stretch of Chuangxin River in Zhangjiang Town, Pudong, as a volunteer river inspector on April 1, 2019. Shanghai launched a “river chief” program in 2017 in a bid to upgrade the city’s waterways. Since 2018, more than 100 residents in Zhangjiang have volunteered to help keep local waterways clean. 

Loaded with groceries, a deliveryman leaves a food warehouse on Weifang Road in Pudong on February 3, 2020. During the city's lockdown to fight the COVID-19 pandemic in February, many households depended on food delivery. 

A policeman working at the Pudong airport for pandemic control in March draws a Pikachu on his protective suit. 

Children enjoy a night fair in front of the Oriental TV Pearl Tower on July 16, 2020. The city government encouraged the night economy in summer to revive business which was hurt by the pandemic earlier this year.