'Hong Kong' ↓

Since there has been interest in the transport between Hong Kong International Airport and Shenzhen, I thought I would post on the topic. So here it goes.

In terms of border corssing bus transport, no service is better than that offered by Hong Kong China Travel Service (CTS). It runs frequent bus service between Hong Kong International Airpot and different hotel spots in Shezhen/Shenzhen Airport via the border of Huangguang (shenzhen side)/Lok Ma Chau (hong kong side).

There is a Mainland Coach Station in Terminal 2 of the Hong Kong International Airport. This is the boarding point. For ticketing, if you are in Terminal 1, go to the Arrival Hall Counter A09 (CTS counter); if you are in Terminal 2, go to the Coach Station C05. 

There are at least 3 CTS buses you can take. I quote one of the buses below. For more choices and details pls check out here

Bus 1: 

Schedule of bus from Hong Kong International Airport (via Huanggang) to Shenzhen Bao Li Lai Hotel:

08:05; 09:05; 10:05; 11:05; 12:05; 13:05; 14:05; 15:05; 17:05; 18:05; 19:05; 20:05

Schedule of bus from Shenzhen Bao Li Lai Hotel to Hong Kong International Airport (via Huanggang):

06:40; 07:40; 09:10; 10:10; 11:10; 12:10; 13:10; 14:10; 15:10; 16:10; 17:10: 18:10

The bus fare is HK$100-150 per journey (Hong Kong International Airport to Huanggang) – early and late buses will charge more.  

The last bus to depart Hong Kong International Airport for the Huanggang border/Shenzhen is 22:00. If you arrive in Hong Kong later than this time, then you may need to think about another way to travel to Huanggang, such as by taking the Hong Kong MTR.

The Japanese brand Lotte Koala Buscuits are the favorite of children. My niece often eat them. Now, even they are found contaminated by the industrial chemcial melamine. It is not a small shock to me. It is scary that how much of poisonous chemcials has entered our bodies, without our knowledge. This time it is about melamine, and who knows next time what it is about.

The mainland melamine-tainted milk scandal is causing four death and thousands of infants sick on the mailand, while in Hong Kong, four kids have been dignosed with kidney stone. The Hong Kong government has to provide free check up service to all the kids in the territory. 

You may be surprised at the food scandal, but Hong Kong people should not.

The fact is Hong Kong has seen a few food scares over the years due to import from China – the vegetables grown with too much pesticide in Guangdong causing peole falling sick, the bird flu, the malachite green in farmed fish, as well as problems with the quality of imported mainland eggs. It is just telling that this city needs desperately to improve its food security and inspection system, in particular related to the import from China.

I guess every thing is double-edged. When the city benefits from its proximity to China, it also suffers from this proximity.

 So to eat local to stay well? This at least is impossible to apply to the poor in China. Now the poor Chinese families are faced with a tough question - what to feed their babies. They cannot afford the expensive foreign brands of infant formula, and at the same time they cannot feed their babies the unsafe local brands. That is really poor. 

Hong Kong experienced the hottest Mid-Autum Festival in 13 years yesterday. And the heat was not the only thing that could have killed you. It was the choking air as well. I was out in the Western District, and I felt eye irritation and hard to breath. When walking home at about 7:30pm, my breathing quickened, and my legs wobbled, in the wrap of hot and chocking air. 

No surprise! I later found that in the Central/Western District, the concentration of pollutants RSP ( Respirable Suspended Particulates), NO2 (nitrogen dioxide), SO2 (sulphur dioxide) and O3 (Ozone) were well above 100 at 7pm, regarded as very high pollution level, even according to the backward Hong Kong Air Pollution Index produced by the Environmental Protection Department of the Hong Kong Government (see the table at the bottom). 

This index is backward, because it is based on an air quality standard made 20 years ago, which now lags behind the world health organisation safety benchmark. That means that what is regarded under the Index as low or medium level of pollution, can also pose severe health hazards, not to mention high or very high level.

This index is backward, also because of the abundance of air pollution an average person like me feels acutely walking in the street, while the index maybe just give you a set of data, telling you the level of pollution, with most of the time telling you that it is low to high, and hence easily lowering your guard against any possible heath risks. 

Of course, yesterday when the city celebrated the Mid-Autum Festival with moon cakes and lanterns, no one would want to talk about air pollution. Not the government, neither the media. Say South China Morning Post, which used “Revellers brave heat to go moon-gazing” as its headline. Heat was the focus, not the pollution. 

No wonder that the Hong Kong Greenpeace has made its own index, to remind the world about the truth of Hong Kong air pollution. 

I will talk in the next post about the reasons behind Hong Kong’s deeply polluted air, with some largely ignored by the public, and misled by the government/media.

Central/Western (source: Hong Kong Air Pollution Index, Hong Kong Environnmental Protection Department; 101-200 regarded as “very high”)

Date & Time                 RSP     NO2     O3      SO2     CO

2008-09-14 19:00        128.2 110.7 113.7 111.4   –

2008-09-14 18:00        125.0   90.2    156.2   95.6    –

2008-09-14 17:00        124.7   62.0    216.6   70.5    –

2008-09-14 16:00        120.6   67.7    203.6   64.5    –

2008-09-14 15:00        114.6   55.3    206.8   50.0    –

2008-09-14 14:00        110.3   51.5    200.9   50.8    –

2008-09-14 13:00        106.6   53.4    175.6   41.9    –

2008-09-14 12:00        106.4   62.2    140.3   31.7    –

2008-09-14 11:00        104.1   72.2    85.7    35.4    –

2008-09-14 10:00        92.3    63.4    58.8    27.2    –

2008-09-14 09:00        83.3    47.8    63.9    18.1    –

2008-09-14 08:00        83.3    54.9    46.8    17.8    –

The Huang Gang (皇崗) (name of the border at Shenzhen side) / Lok Ma Chau (落馬洲) (name of the border at Hong Kong side) border crossing is the only 24-hr border crossing between Shenzhen and Hong Kong. So if you will arrive late at either of the cities, you will have to use this border crossing.

If you land in Shenzhen airport late at night and want to go to Hong Kong, it is most convenient to take a taxi to the border. It will cost about RMB130 by taxi and take about 45 minutes. 

Once you have gone through the Shenzhen control point, you will need to take a shuttle bus (called yellow bus) at HK$7 to the Hong Kong Lok Ma Chau Control point. Then you will land at a traffic interchange. Here you can find 24-hr transportation to the city, such as the 616S night bus going to Mongkok every 20 minutes. 

Also, every day, there are 24-hr buses going between the border and Wanchai Pier/MTR Prince Station/MTR Tsuen Wan Station. The bus fare is about HK$40 per journey.

If you plan to take a taxi from the border to Kowloon or Hong Kong Island, do remember to take red taxis. Only red taxis go to these two regions. The green taxis go only around New Territories, where Lok Ma Chau belongs. It will cost about HK$300 by taxi to Tsim Sha Tsui, or HK$350-400 to Central.

The easiest and fastest way to travel to Shenzhen from Hong Kong is by taking the train operated by Hong Kong MTR. 

There are a few train lines, such as Ma On Shan Line, Island Line, Kwun Tong Line, East Rail Line and West Rail line. The one that goes to Shenzhen is East Rail Line. Lowu is the station that you should aim at, the last of the rail line.  After getting off the Lowu station, the immigration counters of Hong Kong is right close at hand. Then you proceed to the immigration counters of Shenzhen, which is about a bridge away. 

The East Rail train is very frequent, one every 2-3 minutes. Use this search at the MTR website, key in where you start (say you stay in Central, then presumably, you will start from the Central Station on the Island Line), and then key in your destination Lowu of the East Rail Line, the search result will tell you how long the journey time will be, and how to transfer from one line to another in order to reach your destination. You will be shown the train fare as well.

Also at the end of  the East Rail Line is Lok Ma Chau station, which allows you to cross border to the Futian Port at the Shenzhen side. This border crossing is only one year old, used by much fewer people than the Lowu crossing. You will need to transfer at the Sheung Shui station, the second last station of the East Rail Line, so as to broad the train to Lok Ma Chau station. 

Look at the route map of the Hong Kong MTR trains , and you will understand better. 

Also, see my previous post about the Lok Ma Chau Spur Line – Fu Tian Port Crossing.

Let me introduce two properties that are located relatively far from the city centre, but yet are in rather nice seaside or countryside living environment, with shuttle bus service or connection to the public transport.

If you don’t mind the distance and want to live in the countryside like environment, they may be your choice.

These two properties are run by two of Hong Kong’s main property developers, Sino Group and Hong Kong’s tycoon Li Ka Shing’s Hutchison and Cheung Kong Groups.

Gold Coast Serviced Apartments, at Gold Coast, New Territories

These apartments have sea view, and require a minimum of one month stay, from HKD16000 per apartment.  Nearby is a beach.

It provides shuttle bus service to different points in the city centre, and takes about 30 minutes to reach Central on the Hong Kong island.

Harbour Plaza Resort City in Tin Shui Wei, New Territories

Tin Shui Wei area is known in Hong Kong for frequent occurrence of family tragedies where the poor families do not get enough support from the Government. So this “resort city” is inherently not really belonging to the area’s landscape. The place is a bit far from the city centre, but it is on the railway line, at the Tin Shui Wei Station of the Hong Kong MTR station. Travel time from Tin Shui Wei to, say Central, is 44 minutes by train. Monthly rental of the apartment is from HK$5900.

The covenient and also most expensive way is：If you leave from Hong Kong, take the Hong Kong (Hung Hom train stration) – Guangzhou (Guangzhou East train station) through train. When you arrive at the Guangzhou East train station, you head for Tian He Da Sha (天河大廈) on Ti Yu Xi Lu (体育西路 - “Ti Yu” means sports, “Xi Lu” means literally West Road). It would be a 15- minute walk, or a RMB7 taxi ride without the taxi meter jumping to the next reading. From Tian He Da Sha, you can take the Airport Express Route 6 to the Guangzhou Baiyun International Airport.

The first bus departs from Tian He Da Sha at 5:30, and the last one at 21:00. The whole journey is about 1 hour.

The first bus departs from Guangzhou Airport at 7:05, and the last one at 0:10.

One-way bus fare is about RMB20, which will be collected by uniformed staff on the bus. Bus service on this route is every 20 minutes.