Work on five links to Kai Tak to be completed this month
Five of the 25 links to the Kai Tak development will be finished this month, ready for use by the more than 300,000 public housing residents expected at its north apron.
The five links include two new footbridges and improvements to three existing subways. One of the bridges will connect the high-end flats of The Latitude with the Trade and Industry Tower, which is due to be completed in 2015. The 175-metre bridge will be part of a landscaped elevated walkway which will connect San Po Kong, Kowloon City and the Kai Tak City Centre. The second, 80-metre, bridge will cross Prince Edward Road East to link housing at Rhythm Garden with Kai Tak.
Three subways will also be revamped: two under Prince Edward Road East to Choi Hung Road and to Sze Mei Street; and a third one under Kwun Tong Road to Choi Hung MTR station.
Extra shelter made from steel and glass will be installed at the subway entrances and LED lighting fitted in the passages. Murals of the old airport will decorate the walls in the Choi Hung Road link.
"This subway was the main entrance to the old airport. We want to conserve this memory, so we chose aviation as the theme," said Sorais Lee Kwan Siu-kuen, head of the Kai Tak office in the Civil Engineering and Development Department.
Two public housing estates - Kai Ching and Tak Long - will be finished by the end of this year, to house over 300,000 people. Lee said four bus routes, including a new one from Kai Tak to Ping Shek, would service the estates. She said HK$350 million would be spent on the development's first phase. Work on the cruise terminal began in 2009, after the site lay vacant for over a decade.
