People Square is a large interchange station of the Shanghai Metro, located below People's Square in the city center of Shanghai. The station is reputedly the busiest metro station in all of China, handling a daily traffic of 400,000.
The station is part of Line 1, Line 2 and Line 8, making it an important interchange station which now has over twenty exits. This station is exceptionally busy because of a unique combination of being surrounded by office buildings, shopping centers and several tourist attractions. This combination causes it to be extremely busy during peak times, but it remains very busy during the rest of the day as well.
Structure of the Station
Behavior 1
The picture demonstrates the paths of passengers transferring from Line 2 to Line 1. Most of them will choose "Path 1".
Behavior 2
The picture demonstrates the paths of passengers transferring from Line 1 to Line 2. Most of them will choose "Path 2", other than shortcut "Path 1"
Behavior 3
The picture demonstrates the paths of passengers transferring from Line 2 to Line 1. Most of them will choose "Path 2".
Transferring passenger flows from line1 and that from line 2 conflict with each other heavily in the second underground floor.
Plan 1
- Red color stands for passenger flow transferring from Line 2 to Line 1.
- Blue color stands for passenger flow transferring from Line 1 to Line 2.
Feature:
- Close right passageway
- No conflicts in underground floor 2
- 3 potential conflicts in underground floor 1
Plan 2
Feature:
- Open right passageway
- No conflicts in underground floor 1
- 2 potential conflicts in underground floor 2
Plan 3
Feature:
- Open right passageway
- No conflicts in underground floor 2
- 2 potential conflicts in underground floor 1
All plans could solve the problem of heavy conflict in underground floor 2
Plan 1 and 2 have congestion problems in underground floor 1
Plan 2 have moderate conflicts in underground floor 2
In Plan 1 and 3, passengers from Line 1 prefer to choose closest stairs to get to platform of Line 2.
| Walking Distance Average (m) | AverageTime of Passengers Stay (min) | |
| Plan 1 | 298 | 6.6 |
| Plan 2 | 323 | 7.1 |
| Plan 3 | 316 | 6.8 |
| Plan 1 | Plan 2 | Plan 3 | |
| Conflicts in underground floor 2 | Basically solved | ||
| Utilization of platform of Line 2 | Unbalanced | Balanced | Unbalanced |
| Underground floor 2 | High pressure on first group of stars | Passengers from Line 2 may get confused | High pressure on first group of stars |
| Underground floor 1 | Have congestion problems in first door | slight conflicts | |
| Construction cost | Plan 3 > Plan 1 > Plan 2 | ||
| Guide signs | none | 1 | none |
