• Progress of Alignment Study
• Preferred Scheme
• Environmental Considerations

The Consultant has reviewed over 40 previous alignment options, including tunnel and flyover options.

They covered most of Kowloon Peninsula, and included tunnel and flyover options as far north as Boundary Street and a flyover option across the harbour around the southern tip of Tsim Sha Tsui. The tunnel options are shown in Figure 1, and the flyover options are shown in Figure 2.

The review found that the tunnel options across the central part of the peninsula scored the highest marks overall on consideration of environmental impacts, land impacts, traffic implications, and geometric design, and recommended to adopt tunnel options in the Central Kowloon corridor (in red portion).

Subsequently, taking into account views gathered during the Public Forums, as well as factors such as environmental, social and land-use impacts, traffic connectivity and engineering feasibility, 14 alignment options at Yau Ma Tei area were further developed out below for more in-depth consideration.

The general preferred features of an alignment option under traffic, engineering and impact assessments are that they should connect to West Kowloon Highway at the already constructed connecting points at the Yau Ma Tei Interchange, should be mainly in the form of a tunnel and affect private properties or public facilities as little as possible.

Options 4, 6, 11, 12, 13 and 14 are put forward as they totally avoid the community facilities namely the Yau Ma Tei Police Station, Yau Ma Tei Jockey Club PolyClinic and Specialist Extension. However, Options 4, 6, 12, 13 and 14 affect a number of private residential properties. Option 11 is a deep tunnel running under ground level facilities but it requires reclamation at the Yau Ma Tei Typhoon Shelter to construct connecting ramps. Option 12 cannot be directly connected to the Yau Ma Tei Interchange. Option 13 clashes with a large underground drain at Waterloo Road and is too close to the Yau Ma Tei MTR underground station.

Options 8, 9 and 10 adopt split tunnel format where the tunnel tube for one direction runs along a route some distance away from the other tube. This arrangement reduces the width of the site for Construction locally but two such sites will be required. Upon further examination, Tung Kun Street and Public Square Street are not wide enough to accommodate a tunnel tube without affecting Prosperous Garden. As such these options are either not feasible or carry high risks.

Options 1, 2, 3, 5 and 7 (re - designated Alignment Options A to E and presented in detail in the following five diagrams) are considered the more feasible options as they have manageable impacts in terms of community facilities affected, resumption of private properties, traffic disruption and proximity to sensitive receivers.

In-depth evaluation of these five initial alignment options were then carried out on the engineering feasibility and associated impacts to arrive at a preferred alignment scheme. We have consulted the respective District Councils and the Legislative Council Panel on Transport and continue to consult the public throughout the course of the investigation, design and construction of the CKR. Please feel free to let us know your comments.

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In the preferred alignment, the west end of CKR will connect to the existing Yau Ma Tei Interchange of the West Kowloon Highway. The alignment route will connect with the existing flyover at Yau Ma Tei Interchange, and run along Kansu Street and beneath the MTR tunnel tube across Nathan Road as illustrated in cross section below. Majority of this section of CKR will be in shallow cut-and-cover tunnel.

In view of topography and geology of Ho Man Tin and Ma Tau Wai areas, the central section of CKR comprises mainly of deep bored tunnel. The proposed bored tunnel of about 2.7 km long would run in underlying rock strata below ground to avoid affecting the buildings, roads and services at ground level.

The east end of CKR will connect to future Trunk Road T2, Kai Fuk Road, Kai Cheung Road and the road network of the proposed Kai Tak Development. The section of CKR between Kowloon City Ferry Pier and Kai Tak Runway will be an underwater tunnel underneath the seabed in Kowloon Bay.

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A landscaped deck will be constructed at the western tunnel portal so that the vehicular entrance and exit will be moved from Ferry Street to Hoi Wan Road/ Ngo Cheung Road (approximately l00m west from existing LPG filling station), farther away from existing residential buildings. This arrangement will also provide additional greening to the area.

The ventilation building will be relocated from the previously proposed location near Ferry Street to the Yau Ma Tei Interchange of the West Kowloon Highway. The new location will allow a better dispersion of tunnel exhaust to reduce air quality impact on existing dwellings.

An exhaust extract system will be installed to limit emissions at the portal.

As the structural design of the main portion of the bridge was done over 10 years ago, the design standard at that time did not require capacity for future wind loads caused by additional noise enclosures or noise barriers. From a technical point of view, noise enclosures or noise barriers could not be installed on the existing Gascoigne Road Flyover (GRF). The CKR will involve construction of a tunnel under the foundation of GRF. As the construction works will affect a portion of existing foundation or bridge structure of GRF, the existing flyover would need to be strengthened or reconstructed. We will take this opportunity to install noise enclosures or noise barriers on the bridge section from near Nathan Road to near Tung Kun Street to effectively mitigate the traffic noise.

Central Kowloon Route is a designated project under the Environmental Impact Assessment Ordinance. Further assessment on the provision of the above mitigation measures will be carried out during the Environmental Impact Assessment. In addition, according to the statutory requirement, we will consider the environmental impacts and the necessary mitigation measures required during construction and after completion of the project.