Tai O Bus Terminus (大澳巴士總站) is located at the end of Tai O Road, Tai O, Lantau Island, Islands District, opposite Lung Hin Court and near Tai O Heritage Hotel, and is the westernmost bus terminus in Hong Kong; the stop is designated by New Lantao Bus (NLB) as No. 221 when it is the originating point, and No. 55 when it is the terminating point.
The bus terminus is adjacent to the Tai O Waterfront Promenade and provides licensed ferry services to Tuen Mun (via Sha Lo Wan and Tung Chung).
History[]
Tai O has always been known as a fishing village. For generations, the village has been inhabited by Dan ethnic minorities, who felt insecure living on the plain land and built "huts" made of timber on the ebb and flow of the sea bed, which has become a major element in the character of the fishing village in Tai O. The Tai O Bus Terminus, close to the Tai O Public Pier, started to provide bus services on 29 March 1971 when Tai O Road was opened to traffic. After the New Lantao Bus Company (1973) Limited was granted a franchise on 1 April 1974, Route 1 served Tai O as its terminus, while the cancelled Route 6 also served Tai O before it was shortened in 1991 to Cheung Sha.
After the opening of the Giant Buddha in December 1993, NLB introduced Route 21 to replace Route 2R, and when the Lantau Link was opened, NLB introduced Route 11 to serve Tung Chung Town Centre, replacing Route 31 in 2001.
Around 2000, representatives of Lung Hin Court applied to the Transport Department to operate resident buses to and from Central, but the application was rejected by the authorities. [1]
Rainstorm wreaking havoc to Tai O[]
On 7 June 2008, Hong Kong recorded the highest rainfall in one hour since records began. In addition to the serious flooding on the North Lantau Highway near Phase I of the Caribbean Coast, a landslide on Keung Shan Road on Lantau Island caused a road subsidence and a total closure of the road, resulting in a rare situation of water ingestion, communication and disruption of land transport in Tai O [2]. NLB immediately introduced special trips of Route 21 between Ngong Ping and Tai O [3]. In addition, the Transport Department (TD) implemented temporary traffic arrangements from that day onwards by deploying additional vessels to provide special sailings between Tai O and Tung Chung so that Tai O residents could go to work and school as usual. [4]
After days of emergency repairs, the Highways Department reopened Tai O Road on 14 June; bus services between Tai O and Ngong Ping resumed on a limited scale in the afternoon of 15 June; and emergency repairs to Keung Shan Road were completed on 20 June [5]. By then, external land transport to and from Tai O was fully resumed and all bus routes resumed normal service. [6]
Tai O Road improvement works[]
The Tai O Bus Terminus before the improvement works
All along, the Tai O Bus Terminus and the public car park for coaches, goods vehicles and private cars have been co-located in a small area at the end of the western side of Tai O Road, and the entrances and exits are narrow. During holidays, when a large number of tourists from Ngong Ping and Tung Chung arrive at Tai O, coach drivers did not park their vehicles at the designated car park, but instead drive into the lorry park to drop off and pick up passengers illegally, and the passengers on board even directly enter the carriageway after dropping off their vehicles, thus resulting in competition between pedestrians and vehicles for road space from time to time. Although the bus terminus has undergone a number of refurbishments, there are still only two passenger pick-up/drop-off bays, which are shared by three bus routes and are often congested.
In view of this, the Administration has implemented the reprovisioning of the existing Tai O Bus Terminus with a new sawtooth-shaped Public Transport Terminus (PTT) with four bus loading/unloading bays and a loading/unloading area at the western boundary of the PTT for all vehicles except buses. Access for buses and other vehicles will be segregated to enhance the operational efficiency of the PTT. A public open space will also be provided to the west of the loading/unloading area to serve as a buffer zone between the PTT and the loading/unloading area to improve pedestrian flow. To increase the supply of parking spaces at Tai O, a private car park with 100 parking spaces will be attached to the eastern side of the new terminus. Meanwhile, the coach and lorry parking spaces in the existing public car park at the western end of Tai O Road would be reprovisioned at Lung Shing Street to provide 26 on-street parking spaces. [7] The above changes were included in Stage 1 of the Tai O Improvement Project Phase II, the construction of which commenced in September 2016. The total contract value of the works is about $74.7 million and is expected to be completed in the third quarter of 2019. [8]
The new Tai O Bus Terminus was designated as a 24-hour prohibited zone on 3 July 2018 at 10:00 a.m. [9] and opened immediately on 6 July. However, the terminus was still not officially completed at the beginning of its opening, and many works continued to be carried out at the station, and it was later revealed that the roof of the new terminus had been blown away, giving rise to the suspicion of "jerry-building construction" [10].
Route Information[]
| List of Franchised Bus Routes terminating at Tai O | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Operator | Route No. | Origin | Destination | Service Type |
| NLB | 1 | Tai O | Mui Wo Ferry Pier | Service daily ● |
| NLB | 11 | Tai O | Tung Chung Station Bus Terminus | Service daily ● |
| NLB | 21 | Tai O | Ngong Ping | Service daily daytime ● |
| NLB | N1 | Mui Wo Ferry Pier | Tai O (One-way) |
Service daily overnight, no return trip ● |
| NLB | X11R | Tai O | Sheraton Hong Kong Tung Chung Hotel | Inbound Saturdays and holidays during Afternoon Peak Hours ● |
Routes previously using this stop[]
The termini of the following routes are based on the date of relocation. For the current termini, please refer to the relevant route articles.
| List of Bus Routes once terminating at Tai O | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Operator | Route No. | Destination at that time | Terminus changed to | Date no longer using this terminus |
| NLB | 2R | Ngong Ping | Renumbered as Route 21 | 14 March 1994 |
| NLB | 6 | Tung Chung | Cheung Sha | 10 June 1991 |
| NLB | 31 | Tung Chung Old Pier | Route discontinued | 21 May 2001 |
| NLB | N11 | Tung Chung Town Centre | Route discontinued | 19 February 2000 |
Stop Layout[]
| Stop layout of circular-shaped bus terminus (from the stop nearest to entrance) | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| No. | Direction | Bus route(s) | Remarks |
| 1 | East | Alighting stop | |
| 2 | South | 1 | |
| 3 | South | 11, X11R | |
| 4 | West | 21 | |
Gallery[]
.JPG "Tai O-1(0103).JPG (639 KB)")
.JPG "Tai O-2(0719).JPG (1.62 MB)")
.JPG "Tai O-3(0719).JPG (2.07 MB)")
Notes and References[]
- ↑ LCQ9: Residents' and employees' bus services(Annex II), 2001-11-28
- ↑ "斷路斷水 苦困居民 大澳變汶川" (Road transport and water supply cut off, residents stuck in despair: Tai O became another Wenchuan), Sun Post, 9 June 2008.
- ↑ Keung Shan Road reopens with limited access, Government Press Release, 19 June 2008.
- ↑ 加強渡輪服務 確保大澳對外交通 (Enhancing Ferry Services to ensure external transport in Tai O), Government Press Release, 8 June 2008.
- ↑ LCQ4: Situation of Lantau after the rainstorm last month and assistance provided by the Government, 2 July 2008.
- ↑ 中斷兩周大澳昂坪今恢復通車 再遇暴雨 羗山道仍有路陷危機 (Tai O - Ngong Ping bus services resumed today after two weeks of disruption: Another rainstorm occurred today; Keung Shan Road still in risk of road subsidence), Apple Daily, 20 June 2008.
- ↑ 417RO - Improvement works at Tai O, Public Works Subcommittee of the Finance Committee of the Legislative Council, 11 June 2016
- ↑ 第2期大澳改善工程料2019年第3季完成 (Phase 2 of Tai O Revitalisation Project to be completed in the 3rd quarter of 2019), RTHK, 8 September 2016.
- ↑ ROAD TRAFFIC (TRAFFIC CONTROL) REGULATIONS (CHAPTER 374) - PROHIBITED ZONE IN TAI O BUS TERMINUS, LANTAU ISLAND
- ↑ 【豆腐渣車站？】大澳巴士站工人補頂急 澄清上蓋為臨時金屬板 ([Jerry-building stop?] Workers at Tai O Bus Terminus in a hurry to patch up the roof, clarifying that the roof is a temporary metal plate), HK01, 19 July 2018.
Related Articles[]
- Lung Tin Estate
- Buddhist Fat Ho Memorial College
External Links[]
- CentaMap: Nearby view of the stop (old Tai O Bus Terminus)
- Tobacco and Liquor Control Office, Department of Health: Designation of No Smoking Areas - Tai O Public Transport Interchange, Lantau Island (Before Reconstruction)
- Tobacco and Liquor Control Office, Department of Health: Designation of No Smoking Areas - Tai O Public Transport Interchange, Lantau Island
- Hong Kong Tourism Board: Tai O Fishing Village and Stilt House
- Tai O Revitalisation Project website
- Fortune Ferry official website: "Tuen Mun - Tung Chung - Sha Lo Wan - Tai O" Ferry Service Timetable
- Tai O Heritage Hotel website
Tai O Public Transport Interchange
Template:List of Islands District Bus Termini