THE number of visitors to Hong Kong reached 14.58 million in the first quarter of 2019 after the Guangzhou-Shenzhen-Hong Kong High-speed Railway and Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge came into use, up 19.7 percent year-on-year, according to a report written by Cushman & Wakefield (CWK), a global real estate services firm.

At present, it only takes 14 minutes for a visitor to travel from West Kowloon Station to Futian Station, and 47 minutes from West Kowloon Station to Guangzhou South Railway Station.

Like the role of the Bay Bridge and Golden Gate Bridge in the Bay Area of San Francisco, the construction of a cross-border high-speed railway and bridge, as well as traffic infrastructure, plays an important role in connecting the cities in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area, said Tao Ruhong, a CWK executive and the director of  its strategic development consulting department.

For Hong Kong, the operation of Guangzhou-Shenzhen-Hong Kong High-speed Railway and Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge will expand the economic potential of the retail, business and real estate sectors. It will also increase the efficiency of commuting, the Southern Metropolis Daily reported.

The retail industry in Tsim Sha Tsui and Mong Kok has become more active since the opening of the high-speed railway at West Kowloon Station has brought more visitors to Kowloon.

In the first quarter, the rent in all core retail districts in Hong Kong increased except for the slight decrease in the average rent in Central.

In particular, the average rents in Tsim Sha Tsui and Mong Kok achieved quarterly growth of 1.1 percent and 2.6 percent, respectively, based on the CWK report.

In addition to the newly opened railway and bridge, various other projects have been planned or are under construction to expand the transportation network in the Greater Bay Area in order to improve the area’s integrated development, according to the report.

At the same time, it will benefit areas in the Pearl River Delta like Qianhai in Shenzhen, Nansha in Guangzhou and Hengqin in Zhuhai, said Zhang Xiaoduan, deputy director of the CWK’s research institute and author of the report.

(Jiang Wenyi)