Linfen itself is your usual Tier three city, smallish, one of everything, traffic not to bad.

The pollution is sometimes very bad although Linfen has cleaned up its act due to the fact it was getting such a bad reputation so these days its generally better than the rest of Shanxi as a lot of the factories and coal mines have been shut down.

Regarding the Uni you mentioned, I went there for an interview. Pretty standard really. Foreign teachers apartments were some of the best I have seen actually. What did turn me off was a comment from the FAO "we don't worry too much about foreign teachers lessons, we just care that you are healthy", you can draw your own conclusions from that about how the students might value your lessons.

The salary offered was pretty good to be fair for a Uni gig.

If you are just starting out its probably an okay choice notwithstanding the above comment but thats my own personal opinion.