HF: This initial article about the Shing Mun Reservoir relies heavily on information found on the Water Supplies Department website linked below. Shing Mun was known for a time as the Jubilee Reservoir to celebrate the silver jubilee of King George V in 1935. The Shing Mun valley in which the reservoir is located has an interesting history in part connected […]
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HF: Desalination (or “Desalting” as it appeared to be called at that time) was a source of water in Hong Kong between 1975 and 1981. A large desalination plant was commissioned at Lok On Pai, near Tuen Mun, in 1975, but was decommissioned in 1981 because its operation was more expensive than importing water from Dongjiang in China. A Water Supplies […]
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Hugh Farmer: I have been unable online to find any images of the reservoir’s dams or of any other man made structures at the location and would be grateful to be sent any a reader might find. Lau Shui Heung reservoir, built in 1968 as part of the Plover Cove Reservoir engineering programme, is a reservoir located within the boundary […]
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Stephen Davies: An interesting question to which I don’t know the answer, is what the provenance is of the gasometer that still stands (and I believe is in use for stand-by storage) back from the Tin Wan Praya waterfront just outside the Aberdeen Typhoon Shelter West entrance (on the north shore). I’m fairly sure it’s been there as long as I […]
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HF: I have slightly adapted the script below from the original booklet. Thanks to SCT for proofreading the script. Pokfulam reservoir was the first reservoir in Hong Kong, and was completed in 1863 to provide a stable water supply to the City of Victoria. It was one of the first large scale infrastructure projects in the early days of colonisation. […]
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HF: I have slightly adapted the wording in the following script. Before British rule most locals used to rely on water from streams and wells nearby. With drastic increase in population especially in the City of Victoria a stable water supply became a pressing problem in the colony. But the colonial government was reluctant to claim responsibility for water supply. […]
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Tymon Mellor: In 1902 the Public Works Department embarked on the Tai Tam Tuk Scheme. This was divided into the First Section covering the construction of the Tai Tam Intermediate Reservoir and the Second Section for the main Tai Tam Tuk reservoir. The latter would become Hong Kong’s largest reservoir with a capacity greater than the total of all the […]
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Hugh Farmer: Elizabeth Ride has sent another part of 1945 BAAG report on a variety of subjects in Hong Kong during the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong in WW2. This time the report covers: Motor Bus Services – the removal of most buses from HK, bus services post Sept 1942 Ferry Services – Harbour and Island/NT/Aberdeen, use of auxiliary junks, fuel […]
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IDJ: Present day residents of Hong Kong can barely envisage that a major electricity generating power station once dominated the waterfront in the bustling North Point district of Hong Kong island. Today all people see from the harbour is a wall of high-rise residential buildings rising up to the hilltops. However, there are clues are in surviving street names in […]
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Tymon Mellor: With the completion of Tai Tam (Upper) reservoir in 1888, the city of Victoria now had a secure water supply. The “big reservoir at Taitam” would have sufficient capacity to support the population of 146,000; but now it was time to improve the supply networks[i]. However, with a growing population, unreliable rainfall and the introduction of residential water […]
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