Universal Expositions
Since the start of the 21st century, Universal Expositions may occur every five years, lasting six months, on '5' and '0' ending years, i.e. Expo 2010 in Shanghai, Expo 2015 in Milan, and so forth. Countries, international organizations, civil societies, and corporations are allowed to participate in Universal Expositions. The themes of Universal Expositions are broad and pan-humanistic in nature, and the participants must design and build their own pavilions, however, there are exceptions where the Expo Authority at a Universal Exposition constructs pavilion buildings or joint pavilion buildings to maximise participation and alleviate representation costs for developing nations. Examples of themes of recent Universal Expositions include "Man and His World" for Expo '67 in Montreal, and "Discovery" for Seville Expo '92, and examples of joint pavilion buildings for a Universal Exposition is the Plaza of America at Seville's Expo '92 which was constructed by the Seville Expo Authority to maximize participation at the fair by South American nations. The Plaza of Africa at Seville was constructed for the same purpose.
Universal Expositions are also massive in scale, sometimes 300 or 400 hectares in size (Montreal's Expo 67 was 410 hectares, Osaka's Expo 70 was 330 hectares, Seville's Expo 92 was 215 hectares and Shanghai's Expo 2010 528 hectares), and Pavilions participating at a Universal Exposition can also be large, sometimes 5,000 to 10,000 square metres in size, mini city blocks in themselves and sometimes more than several stories in height. (The Australia Pavilion for Shanghai 2010 was 5,000 square metres, the British Pavilion sat on a 6,000 square metres lot, as did the Canadian Pavilion. The flagship Chinese National Pavilion had 20,000 square metres of exhibition space.) Shanghai Expo 2010 allowed three types of Pavilion structures, (i) designed and constructed by the participant; (2) individual Pavilions designed and constructed by the Expo Authority for rent to the participant; (3) joint pavilions designed and constructed by the Expo Authority for rent to developing nations.
Also due to the fact that they are usually held in major centres of world population, Universal Expositions have been known to average 200,000 persons per day of visitors - or more - and some 50 to 70 million visitors during their six month duration. Montreal's Expo 67 attracted 54 million visitors, Osaka's Expo '70, 64 million visitors, the Seville Expo '92, 41 million visitors and Shanghai's Expo 2010 attracted 70 million visitors.
As a result, transport and other infrastructure at a Universal Exposition is an important concern (Seville's Universal Exposition of 1992 boasted cable car, monorail, boat, and bus) and the overall cost for hosting and being represented at a Universal Exposition is quite high, compared to the smaller International/Specialised scale Expositions.
Read more about this topic: Bureau Of International Expositions
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—William Howard Taft (1857–1930)