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Following is a question by the Hon Frankie Yick and a written reply by the Secretary for Transport and Housing, Professor Anthony Cheung Bing-leung, in the Legislative Council today (December 16):
Question:
The Central-Mid-Levels Escalator and Walkway System (CML Escalator System) was commissioned in 1993. The Government built the CML Escalator System with the aim of encouraging members of the public to walk and relieving the pressure on the road traffic in the Mid-Levels. It is learnt that the Government originally planned to build six similar escalator systems at the time but eventually completed only the CML Escalator System due to the excessively high construction costs. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
(1) of the number of average daily person-times using the CML Escalator System in each of the past 10 years;
(2) whether it has assessed the effectiveness of the CML Escalator System in alleviating traffic congestion within the district; if it has, of the details; if not, the reasons for that;
(3) given that the Government has planned to conduct refurbishment works for the CML Escalator System in phases starting from 2017, and some members of the public are concerned about the inconvenience caused to them when the CML Escalator System breaks down or is under maintenance, coupled with the fact that the utilisation of the CML Escalator System has almost reached saturation, whether the authorities will consider building another escalator system in the same district; if they will, of the details; if not, the reasons for that; and
(4) of the details of the other five escalator systems which were originally planned to be built; whether the authorities have plans to restart the plan concerned; if they do, of the details; if not, the reasons for that?
Reply:
President,
My reply to the Hon Frankie Yick's question is as follows:
Commenced in October 1993, the Central-Mid-Levels Escalator and Walkway System is the first of its kind in Hong Kong. This escalator link starts at Des Voeux Road Central, passes through various narrow streets in Central and ends at Conduit Road. The purpose of installing this hillside escalator link was to promote walking, and to relieve the pressure on road traffic.
In the past decade, the Transport Department (TD) conducted usage surveys covering the whole Central-Mid-Levels Escalator and Walkway System in 2005 and 2010. According to the survey results, there were about 54 000 daily pedestrian trips in 2005 and 85 000 daily pedestrian trips in 2010 for the entire system. The TD has arranged to conduct another usage survey in 2016 so as to collect the latest figures before commencing the refurbishment works in 2017. According to TD's assessment, although the Central-Mid-Levels Escalator and Walkway System is useful in relieving the demand for public transport services, it has not led to a large number of motorists giving up driving nor reducing significantly the traffic flow in the Mid-Levels area.
After the completion of the Central-Mid-Levels Escalator and Walkway System in 1993, the Government proposed in 1999 to build six similar escalator systems on the Hong Kong Island. Among these proposed links, the Fortress Hill Pedestrian Link and the Centre Street Escalator Link were commissioned and opened to the public in 2007 and 2013 respectively.
For the construction of the hillside escalator links and elevator systems, the Government published in 2009 a set of objective and transparent scoring criteria for assessing different proposals so as to determine the priority for conducting preliminary technical feasibility studies for the 20 proposals received at that time. The Government consulted the LegCo Panel on Transport in May 2009 on the proposed criteria and reported the assessment results to the Panel on Transport again in February 2010. Two proposals were screened out initially, and 18 others were ranked. The Government indicated at the time that preliminary technical feasibility studies for the proposals ranked top ten in the assessment would be conducted by batches, and that the remaining proposals would be followed up after the smooth implementation of the top ten proposals. The progress of the proposed projects is set out in the Annex.
Ends/Wednesday, December 16, 2015
Issued at HKT 12:39
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