MTR, Explosive Draw at New Exhibition Station
IDJ has sent this newspaper article about the Exhibition Centre (Chinese: 會展) at an MTR station on the East Rail line. It serves the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre and other destinations in Wan Chai North, Hong Kong Island, Hong Kong.
The station was built as part of the Shatin to Central Link project. It topped out on 12 November 2020[3] and began service on 15 May 2022.(1)
HF: I have retyped the article to improve clarity and aid searches.
Thanks to SCT for proofreading the original article.
Passengers will be able to see and touch the shell of a World War 11 bomb dropped in Hong Kong in the new Exhibition Centre Station.
The turquoise green-gray station in Wanchai North is under the East Rail Line cross-harbor extension, which will start service on May 15.
It takes the line across the harbor to its terminal station in Admiralty instead of Hung Hom Station.
During the construction of the station, three 450-kilogram bombs – dropped during World War 11 – were found at the site in 2018.
A police explosive disposal team removed the bombs and the remnants of one of them will be on display at a station platform.
A replica of the bomb is also displayed beside its shell, together with photos of the work site where the bombs were unearthed.
Cheng Kwok-wai, MTR’s acting chief architectural manager (design), said the three bombs could have been dropped in Hong Kong between 1943 and 1945 by the allies, and were part of an aerial strike targeting Japanese warships.
On the same platform, the design team also put up billboards on the walls to introduce the construction process of the East Rail Line cross-harbor extension, including the tunnel.
In interior design, the station follows the classic mosaic style, with the tiles in turquoise green mixed with gray as the main colours.
“The colour tone symbolizes the sea water in Victoria Harbor in front of the station and we do not have to use only one colour throughout the whole station as it will make the atmosphere gloomy,” Cheng said.
“So we used complimentary colours, with colours to calm down the turquoise green, which will make it more elegant.”
There is also a piece of artwork by local artist Leung Chi-wo called Water Memory.
“Mr Leung chose 1,200 photos out of 8,000 he took of the seascape in front of the station at different times of the year and they were displayed on the walls of all three floors of the station that face north, which is the direction of Victoria Harbour,” Cheng said.
‘This will let passengers feel like submerging the station in a variation of waves, hues and reflection.”
Also on display inside the station are historic photos of the century-old East Rail Line, including those of posters, stations and trains that served the line in the past.
But people will have to wait until the official opening on May 15 to see the new station as all 1,400 admission tickets for the open day on Monday ran out in two minutes after the distribution started through the MTR Mobile and The Guru apps.
MTR Corp said all the free tickets, which will admit a total of 5,600 people to the station at different time slots, were taken minutes after the distribution started.
“We would like to apologize to those who were unable to obtain tickets,” the MTRC said.
“We would also like to call on people not to purchase those tickets as they are non-transferable. Our staff will check ticket holders’ mobile apps and refuse those who cannot show their tickets according to our instructions.”
Source: The Hong Kong Standard 6th May 2022.
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This article was first posted on 2nd July 2022.
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