RTX140HM.jpg (Photo : Reuters)
The world-famous "Rubber Duck" installation artwork drew more than 130,000 people over the weekend to Century Park in Shanghai, park officials said yesterday.
The floating attraction, created by Dutch artist Florentijn Hofman, made its debut on the park's Jingtian Lake on Thursday and immediately attracted thousands of visitors. On its first two days in the park's Pudong New Area, it had up to 30,000 people coming to visit the venue.
The weekend saw even more visitors as the weather promised a good time to behold the artwork, said Shanghai Daily.
"Some 70,000 people visited the park on Saturday, the highest number in the past two days," said Chen Jie of the park's marketing deparment.
The volume of people flocking to the park to see the 18-meter-high rubber duck, however, meant a problem with logistics to the park management.
As crowds began to gather to get tickets, the queues became very long, prompting some to resort to buying from scalpers. The tickets supposedly for sale for 10 yuan fetched as high as 15 yuan as visitors became impatient to get in, said local news website thepaper.cn.
Roadsides near entrances became parking spaces when car parks became full. Sightseeing vehicles and bicycles inside the park also proved to be too few for the hordes that came to see the giant toy.
Another problem that drew complaints was the shortage of food and drinks inside the park.
"Even instant noodles are unavailable," said one visitor.
The supervisors of the exhibit, which will run until Nov. 23, said that they will get more eateries to serve during the weekends. They also advised the public to choose non-peak days such as weekends in order to avoid overcrowded spaces.
