May 19, the second annual China Tourism Day, marks the official opening of two new branches of Suzhou Tourist Information and Service Center, which intend to reflect the National Tourism Bureau’s slogan for 2012 -- “Love tourism, love life” -- and to better represent the quality of Suzhou’s travel services. 

 

The main branch, which is on Fenghuang St in the northeastern part of the city, and the Suzhou railway branch have been open to the public since May 18. The main branch covers a 600-square-meter area of a three-story building, whose design is meant to reflect the local culture and character.

The opening ceremony of the Fenghuang St center had its own theme – “Love Suzhou life here” – and attracted Huang Qin, the vice-mayor of Suzhou and Xu Weirong, deputy director of Suzhou Municipal Tourism Bureau.

In addressing the ceremony, Xu explained that the Suzhou Tourist Information and Service Center is intended to develop into an important symbol of Suzhou, which an international tour destination. Suzhou Tourist Information and Service Center has been set up since 2002 and the opening of the two new branches is meant to show that Suzhou now has a systematic tourist service network. The city is planning a reception center that can handle 80 million tourists, as an active place to display all Suzhou’s tourism resources, and to show that it’s a well-known cultural city.

Each branch center has an “i” logo as an eye-catching device and has everything needed to provide professional services tailored to individual tourists. The staff members provide bilingual services, in Chinese and English, while some volunteer service centers, scattered about Suzhou, help spread the consulting services to a larger degree.

The '3-D live-view' sand table provides visitors with 'virtual travelling' by introducing scenic and tourism resources, as well as playing promotional videos of Suzhou City. The technological innovations would become the first-ever to allow visitors to enjoy 'virtual travelling.'

Visitors to Suzhou can access a digital tourist map with an intellective search engine named called the Gusu Xiaodipei (Little Suzhou guide) for more convenient help in getting general information, transportation routes, and available facilities.

The Suzhou tourism website (www.visitsz.com), which also provides travel information, is being equipped with more foreign language versions.

 

For those with immediate questions, there is also a Suzhou 24-hour tourism hotline at 12301.