Nanshi Food Street

Nanshi Food Street (南市食品街) lies in the Nanshi quarter of Heping District, between Heping Road and the Nanshi Hotel Street, facing the Drum Tower. It opened on 1 January 1985 with about 42,000 square metres of building area laid out as a walled Chinese town, and at its opening it held 19 large restaurants, 61 snack shops, 11 food stores and 4 teahouses. The project was proposed by mayor Li Ruihuan in 1983 as one of ten things the city government would do to improve people's lives; construction began on 11 August 1984 after 445 households had been moved out in thirteen days. The four gates are named Zhenyu, Xingge, Zhongsheng and Huayu, whose first characters read 'revitalize China'.