They concealed the menace with Shanghainese flair, filling the wall with shops and topping it with a tourist promenade. Families stroll the wide walkway on summer evenings, unruffled that the water on one side is higher than the ground on the other.
Even before its mid-August peak, the Huangpu already is level with the road, said Zhang Liugang, an official of the city Anti-Flood Office. In 1997, he said, the rain-gorged river ran five feet higher than the road and came within 3½ feet of the top of the flood wall.
Reversing Nature’s Flow
The geologist Liu has spent 12 years tracking the city’s decline. His staff of 100 and network of 27 monitoring stations with sensors drilled 300 to 600 feet into the earth monitor the shifts.
“You can’t see it if you look around, but the problem is terrible. We can’t wait until it’s visible,” Liu said.
In a tactic that borders on science fiction, Shanghai is trying to reverse the decline by recharging its aquifers, pumping in 5.2 billion gallons of water a year.
The program, Liu said, has met with modest success, with land in some areas rising as much as 4½ inches.