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Citizens in New Territories West can only "hard food" the traffic jam?

2020-06-12T09:47:49.055Z


Known as "one small stop every day, one big stop every three days," Tuen Mun Highway was congested due to traffic accidents on Friday morning (June 12). The car was nearly 10 kilometers long. Many residents of Tuen Mun District are late for work, and some people laughed at their future employment


01 point of view

Written by: Review Editor

2020-06-12 14:00

Last update date: 2020-06-12 14:00

Known as "one small stop every day, one big stop every three days," Tuen Mun Highway was congested due to traffic accidents on Friday morning (June 12). The car was nearly 10 kilometers long. Many residents of Tuen Mun District are late for work, and some people laughed that employers might be discouraged from candidates in Tuen Mun in the future.

On Friday morning, there were two traffic accidents on Tuen Mun Highway towards Kowloon near Xiaolan. Some people tried to get out of the urban area, and may not hesitate to bypass the Tai Lam Tunnel. However, the Yuen Long Highway from the Blue Land to Yuen Long is also very congested. Vehicles in the Tin Shui Wai area passing the Yuen Long Highway also see congestion.

The Tuen Mun Highway was congested in the direction of Kowloon. The car was nearly 10 kilometers long, and it was congested to Yuen Long. (Screenshot of Google Maps)

New Territories West commuter population is huge

Although the "one small stop every day, three big stops every day" is exaggerated, congestion is indeed the normal state of the Tuen Mun Highway, and residents in the district have also been deeply troubled for many years. If you live closer to the West Rail Station, many people will choose to take the West Rail to work. The Tuen Mun South Extension, which is expected to start construction in 2023 and completed in 2030, will certainly give residents in Tuen Mun an additional choice, which is expected to reduce the traffic flow of the highway, but the results may not be great in the first place, and the West Rail itself is also in peak hours. It was too much for passengers on Jinshang Road and Yuen Long Station to get on. To solve the problem, it is obviously not enough to improve the transportation facilities alone, and we must fundamentally address the phenomenon of commuting to work in the New Territories West.

We once pointed out from the statistics in 2014 that although the employed population in the New Territories reached 2.03 million, which was higher than the 1.82 million combined by Hong Kong and Kowloon, the employment opportunities were only 1.28 million, far below the 2.48 million provided by Hong Kong and Kowloon. Converted to a ratio, Hong Kong Island, Kowloon and the New Territories enjoy an average of 1.6, 1.2 and 0.6 job opportunities per person. This set of figures fully reflects the unbalanced development distribution of Hong Kong. Separation of residency has resulted in a large number of daily wage earners commuting across districts. In terms of economic benefits, this also wastes citizens' transportation costs and commuting time.

With the development of new districts such as Hongqiao and Yuen Long South, hundreds of thousands of new workers have been added. If the 20,000 units provided by the southern extension of Tuen Mun are counted, the population in the northwest New Territories is bound to increase significantly. If you don’t want more and more "New West Cows" to suffer from commuting and traffic jams, it is inevitable to fundamentally improve the development distribution. In particular, the Hongshuiqiao New District has been positioned as a "regional economic and cultural hub". In fact, it has the potential to develop into a new Central Business District (CBD). By providing a large number of employment opportunities, it reduces the need for residents of northwest New Territories to travel to the urban area.

Hong Kong society has accumulated a lot of problems over time, and the public has no choice but to accept it. But who said that reality must be like this? The problem is unsolved.

【New CBD of Flood Bridge. Proposal (Part 1) Cross-district commuting trekking for separated workers

【New CBD of Flood Bridge. Proposal (Part 2) Unbalanced business distribution Planning for upgrading the Northwest New Territories

[Flood Bridge New District. Initiative (below)】Relieve the promotion of cross-region employment to CBD

01 point of view

Traffic congestion Tuen Mun traffic congestion public transport 01 point of view

Source: hk1

All news articles on 2020-06-12

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