At about 6:00 a.m. on February 6, the Hong Kong East Rail train headed towards Luohu in the morning fog. The interior of the train was very quiet, and most of the passengers had their suitcases by their legs.
The car radio sounded after a long time: "Next stop, Luohu." Hearing this reminder, someone raised his mobile phone and took a picture of the station announcement reminder on the small screen as a souvenir.
Following the first stage of "customs clearance" between the mainland and Hong Kong in January, good news about the resumption of normal personnel exchanges between the two places continued to spread, and finally a full "customs clearance" was achieved a month later: from February 6, all land ports in Hong Kong will be opened , that is, on the current basis, the Cailuo Lake Port, Heung Yuen Wai/Liantang Port, Lok Ma Chau/Huanggang Port will provide travel inspection services; the cargo service at the Sha Tau Kok Port will also resume.
Among them, the Luohu Port is one of the most well-known and most convenient ports. In the words of netizens: if Luohu is not connected, it means that there is no "customs clearance".
Therefore, the reopening of Luohu after three years, in a sense, symbolizes the real return to normal, the return to the days of free cross-border that we were familiar with before the epidemic.
Passengers say 10 minutes to pass
smooth process
At 6:30 in the morning, the Luohu Port reopened after three years, and many citizens queued up with their suitcases to pass the border.
Mr. Zhang, a Hong Kong citizen who wants to go to Dongguan, Guangdong, told the reporter that he needs to go to Dongguan because of work, and he will buy a ticket at Luohu Bus Station after passing the customs and transfer to Dongguan.
During the Spring Festival earlier, Mr. Zhang took the high-speed rail north to Guangzhou to visit his relatives, but nucleic acid testing is no longer required and the quota is no longer required from today. He believes that it will be more convenient to travel between the two places in the future.
At the arrival area of MTR Lo Wu Station, the Hong Kong Tourism Board carefully prepared gift packages for arriving passengers.
According to relevant staff, the red paper bag printed with the words "Hello, Hong Kong!" contains Hong Kong specialty snacks, theme park products and ticket coupons, beauty store products, tourist shopping mall gift coupon packages and conversion plugs, etc.
It is reported that Hong Kong launched the "Hello, Hong Kong!" program a few days ago, hoping to strengthen the promotion of Hong Kong and attract more mainland and overseas friends to Hong Kong.
Ms. Liu, a Hong Kong tourist from Jinan, came to Hong Kong for 4 days and 3 nights. She told the reporter that since there were few direct flights from Jinan to Hong Kong, the timing was unlucky, so she flew to Shenzhen first, and then crossed the border at Luohu Port early in the morning.
"I used to go to Hong Kong to play from Luohu. There is a direct East Rail link to Mong Kok, Kowloon Tong and other places. It is very convenient to change trains." Ms. Liu said that the whole customs clearance process took less than 10 minutes and was very smooth.
And student Shen is a cross-border student who lives in Shenzhen and is studying in the fifth grade of primary school in Hong Kong. She was accompanied by her mother to cross the border and come to Hong Kong to go to school that day.
They live near Luohu. Shen said that after the reopening of the port, it will be more convenient to go to and from school every day.
After nearly 3 years of online classes, Shen is very much looking forward to meeting his schoolmates and asking the teacher to answer questions face to face.
The mother of classmate Shen said frankly that the child's online class at home affected the learning efficiency and felt lonely. Now that she has fully "cleared the customs", she feels "relieved", and is very happy that the child can finally return to campus life.
Cross-border passengers are passing through Luohu Port.
Photo by Li Zhihua
Luohu station fully upgraded
New look welcomes cross-boundary passengers
The passages at the Luohu control point are still divided into three categories—Hong Kong citizens, visitors to Hong Kong and staff passages. It takes 44 minutes" to show the public the "growth" of Luohu Station in the past three years.
In fact, cross-border passengers can take the East Rail Line directly from Luohu Station to Hong Kong Island, which greatly improves the convenience of travel, and the comprehensive upgrade of the station will also enhance passengers' experience and comfort.
Cheung Chi-keung, the Transit Railway Director of the MTR Corporation, introduced the upgrade project of the station on February 3, including the renovation of the toilets in the station and the improvement of shop facilities.
After the redesign of the arrival hall, the ceiling and stairs have been redecorated, and the ticketing location and waiting area have been moved to the right to make the lobby more orderly and have more space.
What's more worth mentioning is that Luohu Station also introduces Alipay, WeChat and other electronic payment methods to facilitate cross-border passengers to travel.
Zhang Zhiqiang said that after the reopening of the Luohu control point, the opening hours will be the same as before the epidemic, from 6:30 am to 12 midnight.
In order to cooperate with the opening of the Lo Wu control point, the trains traveling between Sheung Shui Station, Lo Wu Station and Lok Ma Chau Station will also operate in the pre-epidemic mode, that is, two of the three trains will go to Luo Wu Station and one to Lok Ma Chau Station .
The train to Lo Wu will run every 4 to 8 minutes, and the train to Lok Ma Chau will run every 12 minutes.
He mentioned that due to the resumption of services at Lok Ma Chau Station in January, the train frequency of the East Rail Line has been increased. With the reopening of Luo Wu Station, the train frequency of the East Rail Line will roughly return to the level before the epidemic. The MTR will closely monitor the situation and make adjustments. Adjustment.
After 3 years, Luohu Port reopened.
Photo by Li Zhihua
The tourism industry seeks cooperation in the Mainland
Full of confidence in Hong Kong's attractiveness
"Comprehensive 'customs clearance' with the mainland is a long-awaited long-awaited by the tourism industry and the people of Hong Kong. It is very important to Hong Kong's economy and people's livelihood, and it is of great significance to the tourism industry." Member of the Legislative Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Hong Kong China Yao Bailiang, chairman of Travel Agency Co., Ltd., told reporters that the mainland is the most important tourism market in Hong Kong. With the opening of the Hong Kong section of the high-speed rail and the opening of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge a few years ago, the originally planned tourism development blueprint for the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area has become clear: Hong Kong As a window city for inbound and outbound tourism in the Greater Bay Area, it will attract overseas tourists to mainland cities in the Greater Bay Area and provide a transit point for mainland tourists to travel abroad. This vision has attracted a lot of hope from the industry.
However, everything came to a sudden stop due to the epidemic, and it has come to a standstill until now.
Since the good news of the "customs clearance" of the two places at the beginning of the year came, the Hong Kong tourism industry has already geared up to start preparations.
As far as Yao Boliang knows, many people in the industry have taken advantage of the Spring Festival holiday to go to the mainland to actively expand their business, including learning about scenic spots, catering facilities, hotel facilities, etc., and have re-established cooperative relations with mainland travel agencies and related organizations. Get back to business.
Yao Pak-liang is still full of confidence in the attractiveness of Hong Kong as a tourist destination. This is because in the past three years, many new landmarks and new attractions have been completed in Hong Kong, such as the Hong Kong Palace Museum, M+ and other world-class museums. On the other hand, Also under the epidemic situation, due to the restrictions on initial entry, the tourism industry has focused on the development of local in-depth tourism, "excavating a lot of good mountains and rivers in Hong Kong".
Yao Boliang believes that these will play a big role in attracting tourists with different hobbies.
However, he also said frankly that the tourism industry has been frozen for three years and has just started. The industry still needs time to regroup in the face of manpower, financial pressure, reintegration of resources, and establishment of a cooperative network.
He also hopes that the SAR government can actively propose support measures to help the industry perform better and more stably in the initial stage of recovery.
In addition to the tourism industry, "customs clearance" is also of great significance to the exchange of academic circles.
"'Clearing customs' is really important to us, and it is a necessary condition for various exchange activities. Many of our teachers have won the National Natural Science Research Fund, have many research plans and cooperation, and need to travel to the mainland frequently; Many institutions in the mainland have also cooperated. We are very happy to fully 'clear the customs'." Guo Yike, the chief vice president of the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, mentioned the most practical example in an interview with reporters, that is, the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology ( Guangzhou), in the school's initial plan, the Guangzhou campus and the Hong Kong campus will maintain very close cooperation, including the teaching staff, cross-campus exchanges and learning, etc. All of this will be difficult without "customs clearance" as the premise.
In the past three years, many forums and seminars have been postponed or switched to online, "but online communication has never been able to replace face-to-face communication." We know that the Hong Kong Academy of Engineering Sciences originally planned to hold the Greater Bay Area Development Summit, inviting university presidents and entrepreneurs, but it was put on hold for more than a year due to the epidemic, and it will finally be held in Hong Kong on February 20.
In Guo Yike's view, this is a very good signal. Academic exchanges and project cooperation have gradually regained their previous direction from stagnation.
(Chinanews WeChat public account)