SHANGHAI, June 7 -- THE first phase of Xisha Wetland Park has opened to the public for free, which is part of Xisha Tourism Area in south Shanghai's Chongming Island, Chongming Tourism Bureau said yesterday.

The second phase of the main project will be finished before 2010, Shanghai Morning Post reported today.

According to the scheme, the tourism area will start from the west end of the island and extend along the Yangtze River.

The three-square-kilometer park lies opposite the Pearl Lake, the biggest freshwater lake in Shanghai.

The bureau said that to protect the wetland, it won't open the whole park to the public.

The park is divided into three separate areas: a visiting area, a buffering zone and a preservation zone.

Visitors are welcome to explore the visiting area but the preservation zone is off limits.

A nine-meter-high wooden tower in the par provides a good place to watch birds. The wetland, now designated as a national nature reserve, is the city's largest habitat for migratory birds from the Asia-Pacific region.

The area also owns the Water Art Garden of the Yangtze River and the World Estuary Sandbar Exhibition Hall and other leisure zones, the report said.

The Water Art Garden will be set up on the place where the Yangtze River finally forks before pouring into sea, which covers about one square kilometers.

The garden will offer a good glimpse of sunset for tourists. Tourists there will have the chance to overlook the wetland and enjoy the sunset in hot-air balloons.