Though the former Hong Kong International Airport–Kai Tak–closed on July 5, 1998, its passenger terminal, control tower and hangars remain in ad hoc use, ranging from flea markets to a job-training center, and now, on the runway, the world’s largest golf driving range. All that remains of Kai Tak will be bulldozed by
year-end to make way for a new station for Mass Transit Railway, and over the course of the next 15 years, some 260,000 Chinese government housing units. Kai Tak Point, at the threshold of former Runway 31, may eventually include a 50,000-seat stadium, two hotels, a hospital, 28 schools and a cruiseship terminal.
While plans are ambitious, economic woes have delayed most building in Hong Kong, and no one yet guarantees the land is safe for use. A taxiway bridge to the south apron built in the early 1970s had formed a bucket of toxins. At least 100 tons of aviation fuel leached into Kai Tak Approach Channel, which also collected industrial metals such as chromium, mercury and zinc, in addition to volatile organic compounds such as polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs).
More In Airports
