A notice has been circulated in the last few days relating to illegal buildings in the neighborhood around Hunan Lu, which, if you type into Baidu Maps, brings up a pretty extensive area including the likes of Wukang Lu, Xingguo Lu, and the western ends of Anfu Lu and Wuyuan Lu. Read on after the jump as we do our best to explain what it says. Hint: it involves "renovations."

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Here's what the notice looks like. Notice it's undated, but it's got hella stamps.







Here's what we can make out as the most salient, important points;



It relates to "illegal buildings," or buildings that have been illegally modified. At it's most basic, it's an announcement that the local government will be forcibly restoring modified buildings to their original states, and then says what it means for those caught in the track of the bulldozers.



- If a building has been illegally modified, the government gives the owners a set date by which they must have it restored to its original state. If that deadline comes and goes without the restoration being complete, they'll a) lower the owner's credit score, b) make it impossible to transfer ownership of the building, so no renting or selling it, the owner's stuck with it and c) do the restoration work themselves and pass the bill on to the owner.



- If a building has been illegally modified, but a tenant (say, a restaurant, just off the top of our heads) has legally rented the space out, the government will set a more long-term date for the restoration work to take place, say a year or two, so the shop won't just get pitched overnight.



- If the building's been illegally modified and illegally rented out, everyone's SOL. The resto could get pitched out whenever. This is what happened to some places on YKL.



- If there are tenants living in the illegally modified buildings (say, foreigners, migrant workers, etc), they'll be unable to apply for a residence permit or register with the police at that address.



Finally, resisting the policy could land someone between 10-15 days of jail-time. Not sure what resisting counts as, but we're going to guess "getting lippy" might feature on that list.



Shanghai's restoration projects march on. Mo' regulations, mo' renovations. Just FYI.



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