Town ordinance (night owl) extends the shops time being open like delphin stated.  It is also a good time to go to the island (once it opens up for you) and do some beetle hunting.  You can pull in at least 100-300k a night with just one trip to the island (filling up the basket to take items home).  So even though you might have to wait to sell them (depending on how late you go to island) you will still get a ton of money the next day when you sell them.  Remember to sell the beetles on the mainland and not island because the little girl on the island barely gives you anything for items sold there. 

I don't think many of the folk here have japanese player's FC.  So I'm gonna tell you about what happened yesterday.   There was an event held in the japan AC NL where if you visit a japanese players town you get to keep a rare item and photo events.

It's very random.  I guess all you have to do is spend a little time going around your town and talking to the villagers eventually they will run up to you and suggest you do this or that public works project.

A tip is to walk around without any thing where a villager would ask to take or buy off  you,   except your tools.  That should increase the chance for them to ask about a public works project instead of asking to buy or swap an item you have in your inventory.

the museum one was just like this..

which leads to:

if you are very lucky to get this town status.

then the option for these public works begin to appear.

and in turn obtaining perfect town status for 15 days or more leads to this:

Good luck guys and gals !!

Pay off the first major house debt (I believe it is the one after the first 10k payment).  This should open up the island for you.

Wow those town-hall renovations are pretty cool.  Cost a decent amount of bells but shouldn't be more than one night or so beetle hunting on the island. 

nearly bought it last week from amazon for 37euro ... decided not to
today i saw it was only 33euro at amazon and instant bought it :)

cant wait for it to arrive.

if you have 100 wifi visitors to your town you also get to upgrade the station too.  and they will also be available in 3 similar styles to the town hall upgrade.  It's only on the outside that will look different inside will all still be the same...

just open your gates and let players in.  Can be the same player appearing again and again and can either be wifi or local play.

As your town tree grows bigger the option to sit beside it will open up.  When that happens it will give your some stat details of the timeline, villagers in your town and number of visitors who has visited your town..