Hong Kong Mass Transit, China

The city of Hong Kong has a population of 6.7 million and spreads out over Hong Kong Island and Kowloon. The main islands, Hong Kong Island and Lantau, are both connected to the Kowloon peninsula with bridges and tunnels, both for road and rail traffic. As public transport is well-developed, the rate of car ownership is fairly low. Public transport takes many varied forms. Hong Kong Island is dominated by steep, hilly terrain, which makes it the home of some rather unusual methods of transport up and down the slopes. In the Central and Western district there is an extensive system of escalators and moving sidewalks. The Midlevels Escalator is the longest outdoor covered escalator system in the world, operating downhill in the morning for commuters going to work, and working uphill the rest of the time. The whole system is 800m long with a vertical climb of 135m. 35,000 people use the escalator each day.

Hong Kong has a metro system, owned and managed by the Mass Transit Railway. Kowloon-Canton Railway Corporation (KCRC) operates the extensive train network. Hong Kong Tramways run a tram system with double-decker vehicles. Peak Tram (a cable car on rails) operates between Central and Victoria Peak. There is a light railway system, The Light Rail Transit (LRT), within the northwest New Territories (comprising the northern part of the Kowloon peninsula and Hong Kong's outlying islands). Four companies operate bus transportation in Hong Kong; Citybus, New World First Bus Ltd, Kowloon Motor Bus (KMB) and New Lantao Bus. Also, because of the nature of the region, there are many ferries connecting the islands to each other and to the mainland.

The projects featured in this article include the Airport Railway, West Rail, East Rail, the extensions to Ma On Shan, Tsim Sha Tsui and Lok Ma Chau and Penny's Bay Rail Link.

At any given time, most - if not all - of the above-mentioned companies have ongoing upgrades and extension projects to their services. In June 2003, IBM China/Hong Kong Limited was awarded a US$7.4 million contract to build and maintain a Transport Information System (TIS) for Hong Kong. The TIS will be the central portal for real time collection, analysis and dissemination of comprehensive transport and traffic information.

HONG KONG MASS TRANSIT SYSTEMS

The first Hong Kong mass transit system was completed in 1974. It had three lines; one along the north shore of Hong Kong Island and two crossing Hong Kong harbour to serve Kowloon on the mainland. When a new airport was built 30km west of Lantau Island during the 1990s, this metro system was expanded. The current metro line has 49 stations (33 underground), runs a length of 87.7km with 2.3 million passengers daily.

During 2002, MTR Corporation completed a new 12.5km six-station branch called the Tseung Kwan O Line, running between Lam Tin and Po Lam. A branch from Tseung Kwan O to Tseung Kwan O South will be added to the Tseung Kwan O Line by 2004. Along the Tung Chung Line (running between Tung Chung and Hong Kong Island) a new station, Nam Cheong, is under construction to provide cross-platform interchange with KCRC West Rail.

Planned for construction are a western extension of the Island Line from Sheung Wan to Kennedy Town and an extension of the North Island Line west from North Point along reclaimed harbour land at Wanchai and Central. A further extension of the North Island Line will run from North Point - Victoria Park - HKCEC (Hong Kong Conventino and Exhibition Centre) - Hong Kong. MTR Corporation are currently undergoing studies to link the South Island Line and West Island Line.

The East Kowloon Line, running from Tai Wai to Central West will be built by KCRC instead of MTR Corporation. This route will be built underground for 17km (ten stations, which includes the fourth harbour crossing) with an overground section called Ma On Shan East Rail Extension. This project is currently in progress.

The Airport Railway was completed in 1998. It has two distinct services: an Airport Express Line that departs every ten minutes and takes 23 minutes to travel from central Hong Kong to Chek Lap Kok International Airport (Hong Kong International Airport); and the Lantau Line, which stops at six stations.

The Airport Railway spans 34km. 8km of this is underground, including an immersed tube under Victoria Harbour, and 6km is carried on elevated sections. This includes the Tsing Ma suspension bridge, one of the world's longest suspension bridges. It was built by Anglo-Japanese Construction, a consortium led by Trafalgar House including British contractor Costain Engineering and Construction and Mitsui & Co of Japan.

Rolling stock for this line was provided by Adtranz-CAF. The Airport Express Line is served by a fleet of 11 seven-car trains, each with seat-back television screens providing up-to-date information on flights, MTR services and tourist information. The Lantau Line's fleet amounts to 12 trains, again of seven cars. Whereas the Airport Express trains have seating for 64 passengers in a car, seating in these Lantau Line cars totals 336 with standing room for 264 more.

West Rail is currently Hong Kong's largest civil construction project, costing HK$57.7 billion. This Kowloon-Canton Rail Corporation, strategically-placed, 30.5km domestic passenger railway will provide a much-needed link for areas of increasing population in the northwest New Territories and urban Kowloon. Linking Sham Shui Po in West Kowloon with Tuen Mun, West Rail will have nine stations: two in Sham Shui Po, one in Tsuen Wan, four in Yuen Long and two in Tuen Mun. West Rail will link up Hong Kong's existing railway systems to form a more integrated network.

West Rail will have two interchanges with the MTR and four interchanges with Light Rail. The provision of Public Transport Interchanges at West Rail stations will enable passengers to transfer between various kinds of feeder transport, such as buses and public light buses. The journey time between Nam Cheong and Tuen Mun will take only 30 minutes - about half the current journey time by road. It is expected to carry around 340,000 passengers a day and will also help to reduce a significant amount of road traffic in the region. At the peak of construction 13,000 people were employed to work on the project. West Rail is due to become fully operational at the end of 2003.

WEST RAIL INFRASTRUCTURE

Of the 30.5km route, only 5.6km runs at ground level; 13.4 km is on viaducts and 11.5km in tunnels, which includes the 5.5km Tai Lam tunnel. The northern and northwestern parts of the New Territories are highly prone to flooding; this is the area where the track will be predominantly set on viaducts. All viaduct construction was completed in late-2001.

WEST RAIL ROLLING STOCK

In 1998 a massive train order was placed for 250 trainsets for the West Line, East Line (profiled below) and other regional rail systems. At HK$3.1 billion, the trains will come from a Japanese consortium of Itochu, Kinki Sharyo and Kawasaki.

West Rail will initially be served by 22 seven-car trainsets that will run at speeds up to 130km/h. Each vehicle has five sets of doors on each side and full-depth skirts for noise suppression. Regenerative braking gives a 25% energy saving. During the rush hour, each car will be able to carry 335 passengers (a total of 2,345 passengers per train). The service will run at an hourly frequency of 20 trains in each direction. Trains will be maintained at the new purpose-built Pat Heung depot next to Kam Sheung Road station.

Alcatel Canada Inc designed, manufactured, installed, tested and commissioned a central train control system worth HK$383 million at the operations control centre in Kam Tin. This will allow trains to run at headways as small as 105 seconds. Trains will be fitted with CCTV cameras and digital passenger information panels.

To meet the growing demand for domestic and cross-boundary passenger rail services, KCRC is implementing three East Rail extension lines: Ma On Shan Rail, Tsim Sha Tsui Extension and Lok Ma Chau Spur Line. These three extensions are crucial to the further development of East Rail as the north-south strategic railway corridor in Hong Kong, complemented by West Rail as the east-west corridor. The combined capital cost of these three projects is HK$27.5 billion.

Ma On Shan Rail and the Tsim Sha Tsui extensions are due for completion by 2004, while the Lok Ma Chau Spur Line is targeted for completion in 2007. Ma On Shan Rail will serve the fast-growing Ma On Shan new town, whose population is expected to double in the next 20 years. The railway will be built primarily on a viaduct with a small section in the middle running at grade along the central divider of Tate's Cairn Highway. This will minimise the amount of land used and will avoid disruption to road traffic.

The 11.4km railway will have a maintenance centre at Tai Wai and nine stations located within walking distance of large residential developments.

The railway interchanges with East Rail and the future Sha Tin to Central Link at Tai Wai Station, which will be rebuilt to cope with a larger passenger flow. With new trains, a new signalling system and more trains departing from Fo Tan East Rail will have sufficient capacity for the extra passengers from Ma On Shan during morning peak hours.

When it opens in 2004, Ma On Shan Rail will run a four-car train every 2.5 minutes during peak hours. As demand grows, longer trains of up to eight cars will be deployed at two-minute intervals.

Along with West Rail, Ma On Shan Rail will be one of the quietest railways in the world when it goes into service as it will make use of the same multi-plenum noise attenuation system. Construction of Ma On Shan Rail began on 12 February 2001.

East Rail passengers will be able to go directly to the heart of Kowloon via a 1km extension that will be built in a tunnel below Salisbury Road. The tunnel will terminate at a new underground station in Middle Road. The new KCRC station will be connected by a pedestrian subway to the MTR system at Tsim Sha Tsui. When this extension opens in 2004 it will give the travelling public the choice of transferring from one system to the other either at Kowloon Tong or Tsim Sha Tsui. The availability of a second KCR/MTR interchange at Tsim Sha Tsui will relieve congestion at Kowloon Tong.

There will also be subway links with Tsim Sha Tsui East, New World Centre, Hotel Inter-Continental, Hanoi Road, Mody Road and Chatham Road. Provision has been made in three main sections of the air-conditioned subway system for the installation of travellators to facilitate pedestrian flow, providing greater comfort and convenience for rail passengers and area pedestrians. These arrangements will reinforce the new station's status as the transport hub of Tsim Sha Tsui.

As the Tsim Sha Tsui extension will be part of the principal railway line, it will operate at the same frequency as East Rail. Construction of the Tsim Sha Tsui extension began in April 2001.

Plans for the Lok Ma Chau Spur Line were endorsed by the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region in 2002. Urgently needed as a second crossing to relieve passenger congestion at the Lo Wu boundary with the Mainland, the Spur Line will run along a combined tunnel and viaduct alignment. The total length of the railway will be 7.4km, of which 4.3km will be in tunnels and 3.1km on viaduct.

The tunnels will run from north of Sheung Shui Station to Chau Tau. From Chau Tau the alignment will rise gradually onto a viaduct to terminate at the Lok Ma Chau Station.

Passengers arriving at the new Lok Ma Chau Station will go through immigration and customs in the same manner as at Lo Wu. The new station will be connected by a two-level pedestrian bridge across the Shenzhen River with Huanggang. When the spur line opens, passengers will be able to transfer directly to the Shenzhen Metro system. The Lok Ma Chau Spur is targeted for completion in 2007.

ROLLING STOCK AND SIGNALLING

Major refurbishment of the existing Alstom rolling stock was undertaken in the 1990s at a cost of HK$1.25 billion. The trains have been given an improved traction package and incorporate up-to-date electronic control systems. New trains are on order for the three extensions.

A signalling upgrade is necessary because of the increased capacity of the line. An automatic train protection system will allow the train path to be increased from 20 to 24 per hour each way. Services are co-ordinated from a new control centre in the KCRS's operations headquarters building at Fo Tan.

In 2002 the MTR Coproration was contracted to design, construct and operate the Penny's Bay Rail Link (PBRL). The 3.2km rail link will connect a new station at Yam O on the MTR's Tung Chung Line to the future Hong Kong Disneyland theme park at Penny's Bay. Completion is expected in 2005.

The line will be a single-track railway with a passing loop, allowing the operation of two trains, and will include a 850m Tai Yam Teng tunnel. Two new stations will be built: Yam O, which will provide cross-platform interchange for passengers coming from urban areas to the PBRL and over-track footbridges for interchange between the PBRL and passengers returning to town; and Penny's Bay station, which will provide convenient access to the theme park. Penny's Bay station has been designed to complement the architecture and the 'Victorian Garden' landscaping theme proposed for the entire Penny's Bay region. The station has a combined concourse and platform in the form of an open landscaped arena.

The rolling stock will consist of three existing trains, extensively converted and redesigned to a unique theme in-keeping with the Disneyland theme park. The line will initially operate with four-car trains with the capacity to expand to eight-car trains. Each car will be able to accommodate 180 passengers. The journey time will be 3.5 minutes and will run in synchrony with the theme park.

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