Shanghai’s most notorious stretch of girlie bars, Tongren Lu, closes, but few think this will clean up Shanghai’s seedy side

Rumors of the closure have quickly turned into locked doors on the most infamous stretch of Tongren Lu. But as the last of the girlie bars are shuttered, expats wonder if it will matter at all.

Once upon a time Shanghai’s girlie bars were on Julu Lu, then they moved to Mao ming Lu and for the past five years have called Tongren Lu home. Far from being the result of a capricious pre-Expo housecleaning, this closure was expected by those in the industry. The simple fact was that their leases expired in December. The landlord, the Shanghai Exhibition Center, has new development plans for that area, but plans are currently under wraps, said a government official familiar with the project.

Paul Granville, marketing director at nearby Malone’s, has been in Shanghai for 10 years and has become something of an industry insider. “Everyone knew that Tongren Lu was going to be a temporary situation from the beginning,” he says. “The mission was to make as much money as soon as possible.” And as the swank Shangri-La Hotel, adjacent to Tongren Lu, readies for a 2011 opening, the bars were given their walking papers.

Granville isn’t bothered by the closures. In his eyes, girlie bars will always be part of Shanghai’s nightlife scene. “People like this kind of bar, so there will always be a calling,” he says. The main question now, is where? “Judy, who runs Judy’s, and Lucy, who runs Manhattan, will most likely determine the location of the next district. They are the stalwarts of this industry.” Manhattan has already reopened on Nanyang Lu, a stone’s throw from Tongren Lu.

Ron Austin, an American teacher who lives in Jing’an, is not a fan of the infamous street. “[It’s for] sketch old men who come here on business.” But he muses that in the long run, the closure won’t change a thing. “It doesn’t address any real problems. There are places all over the city like Tongren Lu, so focusing on one street isn’t going to clean up Shanghai, if that’s what [the city] wants.”

Granville agrees that it changes nothing. “The bars will never clean up their act,” he tells us. “They’re making too much money.” ■ Hunter Braithwaite