City prepares red carpet for visitors over ‘golden week’
Fireworks and discounts to be on offer, but some urge more promotion of areas less well-known
The tourism sector has welcomed plans for new fireworks displays and shopping discounts to attract visitors from the mainland for the Labour Day “golden week” holiday.
But the industry yesterday appealed for the government to do more to promote businesses in areas that are less well-known to tourists.
A week before the start of the golden week national holiday, which runs from Wednesday to Sunday, immigration officials predicted that the first day would see peak travel at land border crossings. They said people would make a million trips in and out of the city on May 1 alone.
The city was predicted to see 5.9 million arrivals and departures over the week, with at least 800,000 mainland visitors expected to visit Hong Kong, Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu said earlier.
A 10-minute fireworks display on Wednesday at 8pm over Victoria Harbour will be a highlight to kick off golden week.
The show will create patterns like smiley faces and the letters “HK” and be shot up to 100 metres into the night sky.
The event was timed to coincide with a shopping festival organised by the Yau Tsim Mong District Office and council, which will feature limited discounts offered by 2,200 stores across malls, hotels and restaurants in Tsim Sha Tsui and Mong Kok.
Tsim Sha Tsui is home to some of the most popular tourist attractions including the Avenue of Stars on the harbourfront, major shopping centres and a huge range of restaurants and bars.
Tourism sector lawmaker Perry Yiu Pak-leung said the fireworks would be a spectacular welcome gesture to tourists and boost excitement, but that they were unlikely to be “a key attraction” on their own.
“Hopefully the [Yau Tsim Mong] shopping festival could attract more people and boost consumption,” he said.
Yiu added there should be more synergy between the fireworks and the line-up of shopping perks.
Simon Wong Ka-wo, the president of the Hong Kong Federation of Restaurants and Related Trades, agreed that activities planned by the tourism authorities could help heat up the atmosphere.
But he questioned what benefits there would be for “districts other than Yau Tsim Mong?”
“What the Tourism Board is doing now focuses on both sides of Victoria Harbour and Yau Tsim Mong, but it seems there isn’t much effort being done in other districts,” Wong said.
He added that business in the restaurant industry would see a 10 per cent increase over the holiday compared to non-peak periods.
But Wong warned that takings might suffer a slight drop when compared with the Labour Day holiday last year, partly due to a trend among Hongkongers to head to the mainland for shopping.
He said as tourists increasingly looked for in-depth travel experiences, the authorities should do more to promote the unique features and culture of different districts of the city.
Timothy Chui Ting-pong, the executive director of the Hong Kong Tourism Association, said shopping discount offers would be a “highlight” for tourists over the five-day holiday.
He added that he was hopeful the offers would lead to more spending in the city.
The Tourism Board joined forces with online travel agents on the mainland to promote immersive green tourism, Hong Kong’s nightlife and to engage in “city walks”, a trending way of getting about popular with young mainlanders.
Media organisations and content creators from Xian in Shaanxi province and Qingdao in Shandong province were also invited to tour Hong Kong to promote the city on social media.
Hopefully the [Yau Tsim Mong] shopping festival could attract more people and boost consumption PERRY YIU, TOURISM LAWMAKER
Residents from the two mainland cities are allowed to apply to an expanded solo traveller scheme to visit Hong Kong
The Individual Visit Scheme already covered 49 mainland cities, including many first-tier ones such as Beijing, Shanghai, Chengdu and Chongqing.
The scheme allows residents of eligible cities to visit Hong Kong on their own rather than with tour groups.
The board also distributed 16,000 coupons for discounts worth HK$200 each to visitors from Xian and Qingdao through travel agents and airlines.
During a press briefing yesterday, boundary division commander Ng Hoi-ka said the Immigration Department had deployed about 200 extra frontline staff to cover the travel period and would cooperate with authorities to extend border operating hours if needed.
The Lo Wu checkpoint was expected to be the busiest land crossing, handling a predicted average of 200,000 travellers daily during the holiday, Ng said.
The Lok Ma Chau Spur Line is expected to handle 170,000 travellers a day and the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macau Bridge will deal with 130,000.