Expo City Dubai - Trendinginsocial

The legacy of Expo 2020 Dubai was back in the spotlight on Saturday morning as four pavilions from the world’s fair re-opened to the public.

Expo City Dubai officially opened one year on from the start of the world’s fair and guests were able to revisit their favourite attractions, including the Surreal water feature, as the repurposed site opened a new chapter, The National reported .

About 50 Expo City Dubai staff and their families opened the Sustainability Entry Portal at 9am, welcoming the public to the city’s latest district.

Guests could take tours of four main attractions on Saturday morning: Terra, the Sustainability Pavilion; Alif, the Mobility Pavilion; VisionDubai the Women’s Pavilion.

Later this evening, Al Wasl Dome will “reawaken” with a light show.

“Today is a very significant day because it marks the opening of Expo City Dubai, six months after Expo 2020 Dubai closed,” said Sholto Douglas-Home, the site’s chief sales and communications officer.

“We’ve gone from a six-month-long global event, with millions of visitors, to opening a city.

“We have a number of iconic attractions open that people know and love from the Expo event, including the colossal Al Wasl Dome that we’re going to reawaken with stunning projections on.

“We’ve also got landmark pavilions open with many more pavilions opening over the coming months.”

Although most of the pavilions from the world’s fair are no longer open to visitors — several are completely gone — visitors are free to walk around the site.

“We don’t have a target number of visitors because we’re a city now and the idea is that people can just come here and walk around,” he said.

“Some of the pavilions from Expo are not reopening but they are still extraordinary architectural structures that can be admired.

“Many people have already visited the pavilions before and we’re expecting them to come back just to remind themselves of the experience.”

Although Saturday morning was the official opening of Expo City Dubai, the site has been open in a reduced capacity to the public since the beginning of September.

“We had a soft opening in September with two pavilions open to the public — Vision and Sustainability,” Mr Douglas-Home said.

“It was more to give our staff training and to accommodate interest from schools.

“The weather wasn’t really conducive to having many visitors but it allowed us to tweak car parking arrangements and make sure we were ready for a higher flow of visitors.”

Admission to Expo City Dubai is free but visitors can expect to pay Dh50 ($14) for entry to each pavilion, with a day pass for all attractions available for Dh120.

Once the weather improves, the number of visitors to the site will increase, Mr Douglas-Home said.

“It’s still hot right now but we expect to see a lot more visitors in the winter once it cools down.”

He added that the attractions and facilities would continue to grow over time.

There were more than 200 food outlets during the six months of Expo.