Crocodile

Some great articles and facts that people have added above.

There are many things Hong Kong needs, and I firmly believe a 3rd runway at HKIA is not one of them. Will it be built - absolutely. Hong Kong is run my super-wealthy individuals who use Hong Kong as their own reallife Sim City and they make a very good profit out of it. So they are not going to let a dophin, a butterfly or the interests of 7m other Hong Kong residents stand in their way. The government is run by a bunch of red-flag waving, pencil-pushing, yes-men, who kowtow to the mega-wealthy rulers of Hong Kong. They go to work, then wait for the end of the day so they can get into their chauffeur-driven Mercedes and reteat back to their compound away from the common man. Don't expect the government to ever do anything for the normal Hong Kong resident.

Recent developments including the West Kowloon Cultural District, Zhuhai Bridge, Fast Train to Guangzhou are just three large dollar developments that have been pushed through and approved before any sort of meaningful consultation or study has been done. They are all well overpriced (and will surely come in significantly over budget for whatever reasons they want to make up). It is the Hong Kong public that are paying for these, while they live in tiny apartments that they can barely afford.

I wish I could be more positive, but the cold fact is that there will be a third runway (and once that is approved, there will need to be terminal extensions, road construction and probably a new bridge or tunnel to allow the third runway to full meet its potential).

peasant

Yes, but isn't that the whole point of HK? It's an oligarchical city state with a history of smuggling & money laundering. If you want a social democracy that puts the environment and welfare above making money, well that is what Canada is for. After you've made your money in HK...

Marco Polo

If you read these articles there is a third option - another runway elsewhere in the NT , an idea supported by the ex CAD head also.

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/hkediti...t_12675548.htm
Airport upgrade warrants more options By Song Sio-Chong (HK Edition) Updated: 2011-06-11 07:43
As the reclamation will be carried out at a rather deeper seabed compared with the existing runway, the land reclamation alone will cost HK$38.9 billion plus an additional HK$9 billion to prevent the release of toxic mud. This cost will be sufficient to build a new airport in the New Territories with one runway (option three). Then the new second airport could cater for another runway and meet needs beyond the 2030s or 2040s. But in the current option two, when all three runways are at full capacity by the 2030s, it will be impossible to build the fourth runway. So what will our options be if other potential locations have already been occupied?
More options and deeper study are needed. The author is a current affairs commentator.

www.scmp.com July 3rd 2011
Sky-high marketing for runway plan kept secret Former aviation chief says the public has a right to know what is being done with taxpayers' money Lana Lam Jul 03, 2011 The transparency of the Airport Authority is in question after the statutory body refused to reveal the marketing budget for its controversial third runway plan.
Peter Lok Kung-nam, who headed the Civil Aviation Department from 1990 to 1996, said Hong Kong people had the right to know how much was being spent on marketing "since they are using public money". The authority is wholly owned by the government and operates under the Airport Authority Ordinance.
Lok, who supports a third runway, but not at the existing site, said he was not surprised that the videos only presented one side of the argument and he criticised the authority for hiding vital information about the feasibility of the third runway plan. "If you look at the technical report, there is a caveat laid down that this scheme requires very extensive revision with Pearl River Delta airspace which we share with several other airports," he said. "To develop and implement the changes, we need to confer with Macau and mainland authorities. "If you fail to get their consensus, there's no point talking about how much it's going to cost or if it's cost-effective. They have never mentioned this caveat in all the publicity, which I think is rather immoral."

This report on PRD Airspace is very enlightening - if the Mainland releases more airspace to HK they shoot their new runways in the foot. Then , there is the military permission required...........
http://www.baf.cuhk.edu.hk/research/...s/AirSpace.pdf“
The PRD region also does not have sufficient ‘air corridors’ for aircraft to fly en-route from one airspace to another. All these limitations plus the complex operating environment of PRD region have significantly reduced the flight operational efficiency and capacity in the rapid growing PRD region. According to the forecast by CAAC, the PRD region will experience around 200 million passenger with 1.76 million aircraft movement per annum by 2020. This is about three times as much as the current figures [CAAC, 2007]. The airports in the PRD have altogether 7 runways, with considerations to add 4 to 5 more in the foreseeable future. However, more runways do not necessarily provide more capacity if the airspace congestion issue cannot be solved. Furthermore, the military plays a significant role in the arrangement of airspace in China. In fact, any change in the civil airspace requires the approval of the military. Figure 2 summarized the major issues of the PRD airspace congestion.”

The major stumbling block is - I cannot see them getting the EIA approval passed without being challenged in a judicial review by the same people who won the Zhuhai Bridge review.http://www.epd.gov.hk/eia/english/textonly/aspd_289.html
EIA-077/2002 - Permanent Aviation Fuel Facility for Hong Kong International Airport
(The Court of Final Appeal ordered on 17 Jul 2006 that the decision of the Director made on 2 Aug 2002 approving the EIA report be quashed.)

http://www.epd.gov.hk/eia/english/alpha/aspd_544.html
AEIAR-145/2009 - Hong Kong - Zhuhai - Macao Bridge Hong Kong Boundary Crossing Facilities
(The High Court ordered on 18 April 2011 that the decision of the Director made on 23 October 2009 approving the EIA report be quashed.)

Cathay Boy

Good articles from both sides posted by some dedicated members here. As much as the opposing sides raised some good concerns, however, I would have to say the fact of the matter is if you don't build it, you know for sure HKIA will be stagnant in a few years, and that has a reverse trend effect. If a pax find it more convenient to fly out of Shenzhen/Guangzhou from now on, he's not just taking some of his flights there, he's likely to take all of his East Asian travels there, i.e. switch hubs. Cargo traffic the same way.

At the end of the day, if HKIA wants to simply stay where they are and not move forward, that's fine. But I really worry that Hong Kong, with its economy heavily relying on providing Service rather than Production, will thrive well into the 21st century.

Marco Polo

www.scmp.com
Fourth runway may be needed Airport Authority figures indicate that proposed third runway may reach full capacity as early as 2029, just six years after coming into service Anita Lam Jul 06, 2011
The HK$136.2 billion it would cost to build a third runway at Chek Lap Kok may only buy six to eight years of growth in traffic for the airport before it is saturated again, according to Airport Authority figures.
In three public forums - the last of which took place on Saturday - to lobby support for the project, officials said the multibillion-dollar investment would cater for the airport's needs until 2030 and beyond, but did not say how far beyond.
A careful look at the figures provided in the Airport Master Plan 2030 - a blueprint outlining the airport's development for the next two decades - shows that even using the authority's "prudent" projection of an average annual growth in air traffic of 3.2 per cent, the runway will be full by 2031. Taking the more "aggressive" prediction of 3.6 per cent, the runway would reach capacity as early as 2029, six years after its opening in 2023. This does not take into account any delay the project may encounter during a construction over 11 years.
"The Airport Authority should tell the public if the third runway can only meet growth for a few years," said Emily Lau Wai-hing, chairwoman of the Legislative Council finance committee that will determine if the project receives public funding. "Do we need a fourth runway? We should listen to all opinions."
Hong Kong Dolphin Conservation Society chairman Samuel Hung Ka-yiu said there was simply no more space for a fourth runway ..............................
.. "The third runway is just 1 kilometre from a marine park in Lung Kwu Chau. If they built a fourth runway, the park would have to be removed. How many natural resources can we afford to lose in this expensive game chasing economic growth?"
The third runway would boost the airport's handling capacity from 68 flights an hour to 102, which translates into 620,000 movements a year. According to the authority's forecast, air traffic demand will reach 602,000 movements by 2030 based on annual growth of 3.2 per cent. If the growth continues for just another year, aircraft movements will reach 621,264 - already exceeding the capacity of a three-runway system by 1,264 flights.
Under the more robust prediction of 3.6 per cent growth each year the number of aircraft movements will exceed 600,000 by 2028, and over 620,000 by 2029 - one year before the end of a period where growth demand was said to be sustainable.
In fact, the third runway is likely to be saturated even earlier than that ........................
An Airport Authority spokesperson said last night that with future air navigation technology and improvements in air traffic management, runway capacity could potentially be stretched further.

kaka

i dont think hk is ready for the 4th runway space wise (4 runway parallel means the 4th runway would be close to tuen mun!) and would be running into the ferry routes.
Smarter move would be to bump up the capacity of the 3 runways.

moondog

HKG only has 2 runways. I like the idea of better integrating HKG with SZX (second runway and new terminal are under construction) and moving more China flights to the latter.

kaka

i see that you're a new contributor here, but 1 camp in this thread is a strong believer that airport cooperation does not work. and i'm definately in that camp. look at KIX/ITM; NRT/HND; JFK/EWR/LGA; LHR/LGW; AMS/CDG. We can also speculate how PVG/SHA will develop with HSR in china too.

NRT/HND cooperation eventually led to the rise of connecting pax moving to ICN as it's seen.

moondog

I kind of agree, and I certainly loathe the idea of transiting between HKG and SZX now, but I think I'd change my tune if there was a nice hassle free train connecting the two airports.

percysmith

I also join the SZX skeptic camp.

Does anyone have a costing how much the train would cost?

moondog

IIRC, the Airport Express cost around $4 billion (USD) to build, and that was quite a while ago so it would stand to reason it would cost more now. However, making islands isn't exactly cheap either. Furthermore, a direct link from HKG to the PRD would be beneficial on so many levels.

kaka

there will already be an *ahem* HSR next to kowloon station by the time it comes. we dont need more connections to china without ways out to the rest of the world. People going to peking will still need to take a plane (how much would train takes? 12 hours?) AND the tunnel will be longer, (Victoria harbour takes 8-10 mins by starferry to cross and the channel between Tuen Mun and Tung Chung takes 20-25 mins for a quicker boat)

More channels to china and no extra capacity for flights will not be able to expand hong kong but to be assimilated into PRC and not to thrive as a citystate.

btw, NRT/HND has various direct options. and what happened?

percysmith

The HKG-SZX link will have to go underwater - can't piggyback on the bridge. It's a little longer too (42KM vs 35KM)

If it's routing from HKG Lantau to SZX Bao'an, it won't have many anxilliary uses other than taking passengers from HKG to SZX and back - it won't be a complement or replacement for the XRL or the existing cross-border trains for instance.

Cathay Boy

The fact of the matter is nobody likes to check out luggage and endure another line of re-check-in again. Unless HKG and SZN can be as seamless as transiting from HKG Gate 4 to HKG Gate 22 (i.e., pre-printed boarding pass, no need to pick-up checked luggage), people will simply abandon your airport for a more direct and easier transit at another airport.

percysmith

Agree. The fact that a CAN-HKG service can exist shows how keen travellers are on getting from point to point with minimal stress.

Third runway is the only way to expand the airport. The only valid criticisms against actually doing it from the above are:

- by building the third runway, can we get enough airspace availability to make use of it? We might piss off our neighbours by building the third runway instead of agreeing to use theirs (even if using theirs is not a really viable solution in our POV); and

- 136B is a big chunk of change, do we have enough users to make it pay for itself? If not, can we increase fares on all HKG users? And after we increased fares - we'll price out the LCCs, transit business and encouraged some PRC flyers to fly from Bao'an instead (train link or no) - do we need the new runway now or a later date (maybe 2040)?

HK travellers will suffer from undercapacity, we'll lose some cheap fares and take less weekend getaways, HK on the whole will suffer inconvenience; but that's how free markets are supposed to work - if we want it we have to pay for it.

There's no justification to use government reserves, the Exchange Fund to fund projects where clearly we can make users pay.