Hong Kong Section of Guangzhou-Shenzhen-Hong Kong Express Rail Link (2014/12/03) 

MR YIU SI-WING: The objective of the XRL, which costs $71.5 billion to build, is to connect with its Mainland counterpart and allow residents of the two places to travel to destinations expeditiously. If the issue of co-location remains unsolved, the whole express rail link will see its value of existence reduced. As regards the schedule for implementing the co-location arrangements, the authorities' reply is that it is rather complicated and needs longer time to devise and tackle.

May I ask the Secretary if he is confident that the co-location arrangements will be implemented upon the completion and commissioning of the XRL by the end of 2017; if he is, of the rationales; if not, the reasons for that?

SECRETARY FOR TRANSPORT AND HOUSING: President, I totally agree with the Member's point that co-location is a key factor when it comes to the benefits of the XRL per se. As I said earlier, this is immensely complicated, and we absolutely will not underestimate the difficulty involved.
We were aware of this in the past and also pointed out that we might not be able to implement co-location arrangements at the beginning, but that was the past. At present, we are determined to achieve the goal of implementing co-location arrangements upon the commissioning of the XRL. Given this goal, the commissioning date has now been revised for the end of 2017. 

MR YIU SI-WING: The Secretary has not answered whether the Government is confident of implementing the co-location arrangements upon commissioning. 

SECRETARY FOR TRANSPORT AND HOUSING: President, as I said just now, we know this is a complicated issue and would not underestimate the difficulty involved. Right now we are endeavouring to carry out the relevant work and my colleagues are studying and drawing reference from the past experiences of different countries and regions to hopefully gain some insight. We will combine such experiences with the conditions of Hong Kong to proceed with the relevant work especially on the basis of striving to protect the original foundation of Hong Kong and people's rights under the Basic Law and "one country, two systems". We are now endeavouring to march towards such a
goal.