Extracted from World Heritage Network of China in May 2001, Pingyou, the ancient city, was granted the name of "world cultural heritage dictionary" by UNESCO on Dec 3, 1998.

The distance from Pingyou to Taiyuan is 90kms. Pingyou is the capital of Shanxi province. It is 80-plus kms away from Taiyuan international airport. It will take you 6 or more drive hours to get there if you go along the Jingjin expressway and the Da (Datong) Yun (Yuncheng) expressway. In this ancient city, there is the most well reserved ancient city wall, which is 6163 meter in a circle and 10 meters high. In this city, there are 3000-plus ancient houses, 22 exchange shops in Qing dynasty including the "Ri Shengchang" Exchange shop, which is the first finance institution in the modern China, and numerous shops, which were set up in the 17 and 19 century; The Shuanglin temple in southwest of the county gained the name of "house of the colored sculpture in the orient". In addition, there are Zhenguo temple, which isthe historical and cultural relics under state, Dacheng palace built in Jin dynasty and Xu palace and so on. The social has invested 0.3billion yuan to protect these cultural heritages as well as to apply for the world heritage.

Therefore, in Pingyou, the houses are built with black bricks and gray tiles, which make the city look like in the Ming and Qing dynasty. In addition to that, the historic sites integrated with culture and art give the city a strong taste of oriental culture.

Tianzhong, a professor of Jingdu university of Tokyo and one of the experts in the international historical sites council of UNESCO, highly appraised this city: "the ancient city-Pingyou is an outstanding example of Chinese capital in Ming and Qing dynasty. It saves all the characters in that period and can reflect the development in all aspects including culture, society, economy and religion in old times, ... even in the world, it is worth being reserved." Not only in China but also in the world there are few cities, which can be reserved as perfect as Pingyou.

Status: in the recent years, Pingyou in Shanxi province has attracted more and more attentions from the world. Here there are well reserved cities built in Ming and Qing dynasty and the houses in the streets and alleys remind people of the old times. From the numerous exchange shops, we can see its prosperity in old times; the old South Street shows the culture in Jin and Shang dynasty.

The ancient city, Pingyou, is the mirror of cities in Ming and Qing dynasty. In 1997, the city was included in the dictionary of "World Cultural Heritage"; and on Nov. 30, 1998, the legislation of Shanxi People's Congress issued the "rules of protections of the ancient city--Pingyou in Shanxi province", which is the first provincial legislation corresponding to the protection for historical and cultural famous cities; in the recent years, the State has allocated more than 60 million yuan from the special-purpose funds for purpose of protecting famous cities and Shanxi province has allocated more than 10 million yuan for protection and management of the historical street--South Street in Pingyou.

In the recent years, Pingyou government has taken various measures as well as made full use of policies and collected capitals from various sources to plan, protect and manage the old city. Since the year of 1997, the amount of visitors to Pingyou has increased year by year. The ancient city--Pingyou will show its luster as it was in old times.

The guiding idea of "protecting ancient city and building new area" has been set in the general plan of Pingyou county as early as in mid-80s resulting in the effective protection of layout and historical appearance of the ancient city. But as time goes by, the new requirements for protection of Pingyou County comes out. It is obvious that the old plan has been out-dated. Therefore, some experts from Shanghai Tongji University and Shanxi Planning Institute have been invited to revise and adjust the general plan. In order to protect the historical characters of the old city and promote the protecting level, the plan is revised in all aspects regarding the character, function, scale and orientation of the county.

The issuing and enforcing of "rules of protections of the ancient city--Pingyou in Shanxi province" has strengthened the protection of the ancient city. After the rules was put into practice, the county enforced the protection in different zones and levels according to the full protection policy. Since 1999, they have taken measures to repair the old buildings without removing its old appearance. They have monitored 22 households covering 1380 meters area and taken measures to stop destroying the houses built in the old times. In the meantime, they removed the buildings, which do not go well along with the ancient city.

The South Street is a key point in Pingyou County. It's importance to Pingyou as that of Wang Fujing to Beijing. The South Street is in the center of the ancient city. In this street, there are lots of traditional buildings, which have existed for over 100 years. But most of them have been out of repair for long time, so some of them have lost their former appearance. Moreover, the telephone lines, power lines and various kinds of lines have affected the ancientry in the county.

The county leaders have realized that this county belongs to human being. Thereby, they take lots of efforts to repair the old buildings and try to revive their old appearances.

Due to the fund deficiency, the government of the county calls for participation of the people into the reparations of the old buildings. As to the shops along the street, the government has taken preferential policies such as "two-free and 8-minus" policy (that is rent-tax-free for 2 years and half for 8 years). There have been 64 curio businessmen investing for the reparations of over 400 shops and yards in 68 different places. They also reallocated the lines and rebuilt the roads and the old appearance of this county comes back again.

In Pingyou, currently existing about 4000 houses built in Ming and Qing dynasty. Except the over 400 houses under good reservation, the other have been destroyed to different extend. Thereby, this county carries on the repairing process to revive their former appearance. They have repaired the houses of Lei Lvtai, Wang Jinting and Wang Peisen and so on. Moreover, they removed the residents in the former residence of Lei Lvtai, who was the founder of Ri Shengchang exchange shop. In addition, they have also paid more attention to the residents' education about protection of historical and cultural heritages, leading them to participate in the management and development process. At present, there have been key resident yards in 6 different places renovated. Deng Baoguo, living in No.6 key house in Hu Ludu collected 0.5 million yuan by himself, repairing 46 rooms covering an area of 1300 square meters and established the Hun Qimo art house.

In order to improve the environment in the ancient city, the county government took the lead to move out of the old yamen and some other institutions such as chemical fiber factory, polyamide fiber factory and so on also moved out of the old city to new region.

After the yamen was empty, the government took measures such as stock cooperation to collect money renovating the old buildings. In the meantime, they also organized the cabers in Party and government organizations to participate in the voluntary labor recovering the moat with a length of 2000m, giving the old city its former appearance.