Hong Kong’s airport extension project will be finished on time, city’s No 2 official Eric Chan vows
- New three-runway system will be completed this year, Chief Secretary Eric Chan insists
- Transport officials say suggestions project faced delays are ‘groundless’
Chief Secretary Eric Chan Kwok-ki said that plans to expand and improve airport facilities were a major goal of the administration.
“As we return to normality after the pandemic, we are striving to increase the capacity of Hong Kong International Airport while continuing to build an ‘airport city’ at full speed,” he added. “Among our plans, we expect to complete the airport’s three-runway system this year.”
The airport’s HK$141.5 billion (US$18 billion) expansion project started in 2016 and includes a new 3.8km (2.3 mile) runway that came into service in 2022, a second terminal building opposite the present one, as well as another concourse.
Chan said the 650 hectare (1,606 acre) project would increase airport capacity by 50 per cent, seen as key to the development of Hong Kong and the south of mainland China.
But he said the work was more complicated than just tacking on a new runway.
“Don’t think that the three-runway system is just as simple as building one runway,” Chan added. “In fact, it is almost like building one more airport.”
He was speaking after media reports that the project had suffered delays, claiming part of the second terminal development was postponed until 2025 and that the new concourse would not be ready until 2026.
The Airport Authority and the Transport and Logistics Bureau denied the project faced hold-ups, but did not say when the new terminal and concourse buildings would be operational.
The transport bureau said on Friday that there was “a clear target” for the airport authority to complete all the project’s building and infrastructure works and have the three runways in service in 2024.
“There is absolutely no question of delay of the three-runway system project and any such allegation is groundless,” officials said.
The authority added on Friday that reconfiguration work for the central runway was “continuing as planned” with construction advancing “steadily on all fronts”.
It agreed the system would be completed in 2024.
The authority said it expected annual passenger figures at the airport to recover to about 70 million by the end of 2024. It added that passenger numbers had hit “about 80 per cent of pre-pandemic levels” over the December holiday period.
But the airport only handled 39.5 million passengers in 2023, 53 per cent of the 2018 record of 74.7 million passengers.
Steven Yiu Siu-chung, executive director of the authority, earlier told the Post that the new Terminal 2 would open in phases, depending on the traffic exceeding 75 million passengers. But he added the slow recovery of outbound travel from the mainland remained a concern.
The present terminal facilities at the airport were designed to handle up to 80 million passengers a year.
The MTR Corporation on Saturday said that there would be an additional 22 return high-speed train trips between Hong Kong’s West Kowloon and Shenzhen’s Futian stations between February 11 and 13, increasing the frequency to 105 return trips over the three days, to meet the holiday demand.
The rail operator also began to boost commuter rail services from Saturday.
Most city lines will run overnight on Friday and Lo Wu-bound trains on the East Rail line will operate for two hours longer than usual on February 9 and 11.
