Control points across Hong Kong logged nearly five million cross-boundary travels during the four-day Easter holiday, marking a 17 percent year-on-year increase.
Key land crossing ports along Chinese mainland borders were swamped with the busiest crowds, in keeping with a surge observed in outbound travels by Hong Kong residents heading to mainland cities.
Figures released by the Immigration Department showed that the special administrative region’s land, air and sea checkpoints recorded a total of 4.89 million passenger trips from Friday to Monday, marking a rough 17 percent year-on-year increase but some one million shy of the authority’s pre-holiday estimate.
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Among them were 2.38 million outbound trips, with 1.86 million made by Hong Kong residents — a rise of five percent compared to the same timeframe last year.
Friday marked the peak of the single-day departure flow with 831,843 exits. On Monday, the last day of the Easter break, the SAR ushered in the largest returning horde, as indicated by the single-day inbound total of 767,479.
Long queues, thick congestion, and prolonged crossing times were repeatedly experienced at various ports, with several major checkpoints along the mainland border among the busiest.
On Friday, Shenzhen Bay, West Kowloon High-Speed Rail Station, and Futian checkpoint in Shenzhen all reported outbound crossing numbers that hit post-COVID 19 pandemic record highs.
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Throughout the four-day break, the Lo Wu, Lok Ma Chau Spur Line, and Shenzhen Bay were the top three busiest crossing ports, with 930,025, 850,748, and 659,355 passenger trips respectively.
They are followed by the checkpoint at the Hong Kong International Airport, which saw the fourth largest flow of Hong Kong border-crossing travelers leaving the city, with trips totaling 620,335.
The Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge and West Kowloon High-Speed Rail Station — the city’s only high-speed railway terminal that links to the country’s sprawling rail network — were also among the most active, respectively recording 609,935 and 458,239 passenger trips.
