Hong Kong Park weather station opened
A weather station has been set up in Hong Kong Park to let people check temperatures in Central online or by phone.
The HK$40,000 station is powered by solar energy and sends temperature readings to the Observatory every minute. The department updates the information on its webpage every 10 minutes. People can also dial 187 8200 for weather information.
It is part of the Observatory's 'one district, one station' initiative launched in March, which aims to set up automatic weather stations in every district by 2009. Before now, there was only one in Central and Western District - on The Peak.
'It is mainly for tourists to know by how much The Peak is cooler [than the ground],' Observatory director Lam Chiu-ying said.
'The station [at Hong Kong Park] is for people working in Central. If you live in Sheung Shui and work in Central, you don't want to come here with a big jacket but then see people walking around in T-shirts.'
The Observatory's acting senior scientific officer, Tam Kwong-hung, said: 'We picked Central first mainly because it is a political and financial hub.'
A station at the Museum of Coastal Defence in Shau Kei Wan will come into service on September 17 to serve Eastern district, and one in Kowloon Tsai Park in Kowloon City will begin operating early next year.
The other four - in Wan Chai, Wong Tai Sin, Sham Shui Po and Kwun Tong - will be ready by 2009.
'On fine days in winter, the temperature near the border in the north can be 10 degrees lower than the temperature in Central,' Mr Lam said.
'There are really a lot of temperature variations - much more than people realise. 'It is important for us to have temperature readings from all over Hong Kong. In the past, we just had stations in areas scientifically significant in terms of weather. But residents in every district would like to know the temperature of their areas, so we decided to set up stations in every district to fill the gap.'
Check weather.gov.hk for details
