Shanghai’s historic Jade Buddha Temple moved 30 metres to accommodate more visitors
Historic monument is transported to new site in painstaking operation
Shanghai’s historic Jade Buddha Temple has been successfully moved 30 metres north from its original location through a painstaking feat of engineering.
The delicate operation required the 2,000-tonne temple to be lifted by hydraulic jacks and moved whole along special rails at a speed of 3cm per minute, to avoid damaging the precious statues inside, according to a Beijing Youth Daily report on Monday.
The relocation began on September 2, after three months of project planning and preparation and finished at the weekend.
The reason behind the move was so that more tourists could be accommodated inside a larger front courtyard, a temple manager was quoted as saying in Sixth Tone.
This would minimise the fire risk to the temple’s century-old wooden structures during festivals, where visitors usually burn large quantities of incense as part of their worship.
The cost of the move has not been disclosed, but Sixth Tone reported that the temple is currently accepting donations from visitors to pay for the ambitious project.
The historic attraction currently receives around 2 million visitors a year, with up to 100,000 a day during peak times such as Lunar New Year, according to China Daily.
