Is Hong kong a city?

I hear numerous times on the local news about 'the city' (no different to most multinational media sources I should add) - but is Hong Kong a city? From the GovHK website:


Geography
At the south-eastern tip of China,
Hong Kong covers Hong Kong Island, Lantau Island, the Kowloon Peninsula
and the New Territories, including 262 outlying islands. Between Hong
Kong Island and the Kowloon Peninsula lies Victoria Harbour, one of the
world's most renowned deep-water harbours. Total area: 1 104 square kilometres Land developed: less than 25% Country parks and nature reserves: 40%

Surely reference, at least by local media, should be made to the 'Hong Kong SAR Provence' rather than to 'the city?

If Hong Kong is a city where do the city limits start/stop?

Cara,

I do believe that it has an impact upon public thinking - 'city' has the connotation of concrete, high rise etc etc. but Hong Kong has so much more to offer, for instance 49 species of snake, wild deer & boar, organic farms etc. This is why the UK drew up the principle of 'green belt', areas that should not be built upon (but which is sadly now under threat).
So where does the city end and the 'country' begin, where do we draw the line on mass development? Or maybe we don't, bring in the readymix!

The original city limits of Victoria (the name originally given to the city of Hong Kong) are still visible in the form of stone (granite) pedestals, one along the Morning Trail (the trail that snakes up to the Peak from near the top of HKU) and one along Bowen Road. There may be (or may have been) other markers, but I can't think of them right off. While interesting from a historical standpoint, they are practically meaningless today.


Hong Kong is also "Asia's World City", if you believe what the government says. (grin)

The HK SAR includes over 430 mostly small and uninhabited islands, including Lantau Island which is four times the size of Hong Kong Island (Victoria Island) itself, and mostly undeveloped. So while there is plenty of land area in the HK SAR which is not what one would tend to call "city", the actual developed areas are the most densely populated acres on planet Earth. To not call this a CITY is a bit silly, even if the legal designation is something like "The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China" and isn't "the City of Hong Kong" or "Hong Kong City". It has the infrastructure, districts, government, public facilities, population, etc... that one would expect to find in any big city of the world.

Of course, in a purely legal sense, Hong Kong is a corporation. That is why it has a Chief Executive, and not a mayor. Then again, Canada is a corporation, too (listed on the New York Stock Exchange!) and so is the U.S. Government. Washington, D.C. legally speaking, is not a city, but who wouldn't call it one? The world is full of surprising stuff, if you scratch the surface and want to get picky enough. (Normally only lawyers or journalists do, and governments don't like it if they raise too many questions about some of this stuff.)

Monaco is a principality, but it is also a small city. The Vatican City is just a small enclave within Rome, but is legally separate and calls itself a city. Most people would say that Macau can be called a city, too, but technically it is also an SAR. In reality, technical naming anomalies and legalistic government structures do not make a place a city, or not a city. People and facilities (and perhaps in some cases a government) do.