New Tung Chung Road to South Lantau

Does anybody know when this road will be complete and open to traffic, and will the current "residents only" restrictions on its use be removed? It seems to be at least a year behind its original completion date, and even the short section already open to traffic seems to be in need of major repair, with no provision for walkers.

I don't know for sure but we have many friends on that side of the island and so travel over fairly often with a particular taxi driver. I have asked him (as well as our friends who live that side) your exact questions. The answers were: even once the road is open, only residents will be allowed to use it - not the general public. The difference for residence being that at present they are only allowed to use the road between 6pm and 6am. Once the road is open, they expect to be able to use it 24/7.


As for the actual completion of the road, well the story goes like this... when the government originally put out tenders to do the work, it came down to two quotes. The one froma company in China, the other a HK based company. The China company was much cheaper and so they were given the job. The road was practically complete around the middle of this year and due to open any day when we had all of that flooding over the summer. The flooding literally washed away huge sections of the road. Then the dilemma was whether to get a new company to "patch up the road" (but the damage was very extensive) or whether to "start again" as such. Not sure what the outcome of that was but the general consensus amongst the local taxi drivers is that it will not even be open the the end of 2009!!


As I said before, not of this is factual. It is all based on local residents and the blue taxi drivers. Just thought I'd share what I ahd heard...

I've heard so many stories that it's hard to guess which one has the greatest ring of truth about it, including who will be allowed to use it and when. Even Highways Department's web site contains conflicting information, the last quarterly newsletter issued back in March stating October 2008 opening, the blurb on the web site stating opening in January 2009, and the signs posted at the new road entrance indicating 31st December 2008. The project started in June 2004 (according to the Government web site), at a cost of $624M, and as it's coming up to its fifth birthday one can only assume that it will open one day soon. It seems to be the project that Government would rather forget about than push to get it completed and opened to public use. The old road still seems to be intact, despite heavy rainfall in the summer, but once the old road is removed does it mean the new road going to disappear every time it rains, cutting off road access to south Lantau? It must be a worry for those living there.

Yes, I have also heard many stories. One thing that everyone agrees on is that once the new road is open, only local residents and taxi/ bus drivers will have permits to drive on it. Not anyone else (not great news for us as we would love to visit friends in our car rather than reply on taxis every time). However, I can see how this can be true since even the new road is only a single lane going both ways with no provision made for passing, so if all of HK was open to it, it would be rather chaotic. Even the taxi drivers say it's a crazy design because the old road at the moment still allows them to pass slow buses but the new road is a double middle lane all the way!


As for the opening date - well that is very much a disputed fact! I doubt even the government has an answer to that one although I do see work being done on the road constantly (Christmas Day included) so they obviously haven't abandoned the project all together. I doubt the road will be open before the summer rains arrive. If it is still standing afterwards then maybe that is a sign that all is well!!


The people living there have resigned themselves to never seeing the road open by the looks of things! I think they are so fed up with eagerly awaiting the new posted opening date that they have just given up. Can't say I blame them. It was supposed to be completed ages ago.

I find it difficult to understand why the Government would want to spend all that money for no tangible benefit, the 30kph speed limit being the same and, as you say, even greater difficulty passing buses and lorries with fewer passing opportunities than exist on the old road. Surely it would have been significantly cheaper and less disruptive to simply improve the old road and road alignment, which had stood the test of time, unlike the new road which collapsed as soon as it rained heavily.

Yes, one would have thought...


Spoke to another peson today who knows builders working on the road. The builders say the work is going full steam ahead and they are almost complete. That doesn't necessary mean the road will open as soon as it is completed though. As for the permit story - that is pretty much confirmed. The person I spoke to today also said that only residents will have driving permits for the road. Seems crazy but then again this isn't the first time I have been shaking my head at the logic of things in HK!!

Highways Department are predictable in their modus operandi. On New Year's Eve the date for completion of the southern section was suddenly changed from 31/12/08 to 31/01/09. This presumably is a best guess date and one can anly assuming that the date is likely to continue changing until the contractor eventually stumbles to completion. The notice boards informing the public of the completion dates are less than truthful. They indicate that the latest revised completion date was the original planned completion date, which is clearly not the case.