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The Shanghai World Expo had its busiest day yesterday since the opening weekend, but attendance still fell hundreds of thousands short of expectations.
In its opening week, the multi-billion yuan expo - the largest and most expensive in the event's history - has been plagued with problems ranging from huge queues to soaring temperatures to disappointing attendance figures. 
Visitor numbers yesterday broke 200,000 for just the third time since the park opened on May 1, brining the total to slightly more than 1.25 million. 
Queues at the busiest pavilions, including those of Japan, Saudi Arabia, Germany and Hong Kong, were back up to three hours or more, while visitors to most smaller exhibits also experienced waits of at least 30 minutes. 
The fair needs to maintain a daily average of 380,000 visitors over its six-month run to hit the target attendance of 70 million. 
Organisers claim to have sold 33 million advance tickets and have promised to dish out at least 7 million free tickets to Shanghai residents. 
However, high-level staff working on national pavilions and related companies widely predict attendance will fall a long way short of expectations. 
A Shanghai government official connected to the expo said yesterday that the first week's low numbers had surprised organisers.
'City leaders are starting to get a little worried,' he said. 'The public reaction has not met with expectations. We are now actively looking at what we can do to improve attendance.'
He said he believed negative reports in local press during a six-day soft opening and during the opening days had probably dampened locals' interest. 'We can't really blame the media. We hope that we can make improvements to counter those initial impressions in time for the summer holidays, when more students will be able to visit.' 
Despite the lower-than-expected visitor numbers, there are signs the park is failing to hold up. Pavements and pedestrian zones have deteriorated over the eight days the park has been in operation.
In many places around the site, paving stones are cracked and crumbling, decorative mosaics are starting to come apart, and a significant number of toilets are closed for maintenance. 
'They should fix that,' said one elderly visitor from Hangzhou  looking at a badly broken concrete manhole cover in the centre of the park.  'I can't believe that has happened in just a week.'



Busiest day yet but attendance still short of expectations