Shanghai pursues luxury travelers despite tough times | usatoday.com

Global travel may be ailing, but China's biggest city of Shanghai is pursuing luxury travelers with a vengeance, bent on restoring a reputation for opulence and elegance that once made it the Paris of the Orient. As it spruces up for next year's six-month-long World Expo, the metropolis of 20 million is transforming itself from a gritty industrial hub of crammed tenements into a showcase of glittering skyscrapers, quaint but quiet alleyways and meticulously landscaped parks.