Villagers living near the route of the cross-border express railway want its construction halted. They say it has dried up their wells and damaged houses.
About 20 residents of century-old Ngau Tam Mei village held a demonstration yesterday calling for the work to stop until safety measures had been introduced to protect them.
The residents said they held the protest after hearing on Monday that blasting work was expected to resume soon on the underground express line. Work on the HK$66.9 billion railway from West Kowloon to Shenzhen started in 2010, and blasting in their area had been due to finish this month.
The MTR Corporation said blasting started on May 2 and there were some preliminary works at the site before that. Tunnelling work will start when blasting ends this month.
Villagers said more than 200 wells had gone dry because of the work, which blocked some water sources.
An MTR Corp spokeswoman said it had been monitoring nine wells and set up 20 other meters to check the underground water levels. When tunnelling started, it would lay down concrete lining at the same time to protect the underground water and soil structure, she said.