We’ve shared our five favourite harbourfront spaces. We walked you through all the spaces along Hong Kong Island’s newly connected waterfront — good and bad. Now it’s time to cross Victoria Harbour and check out what’s happening in Kowloon.
Not long ago, Kowloon had even less access to the harbour than Hong Kong Island, but this is quickly changing, thanks to a host of ambitious new spaces that have opened in the past few years. The main issue is that there are still a lot of gaps: at the moment, you can’t walk from one end of Kowloon to the other without detouring inland. Will that change in the coming years? That’s the topic of the next and final instalment in this series.
In the meantime, though, imagine we’ve finished our walk on the island. Now we’re boarding the Fortune Ferry at Sai Wan Ho Pier and taking it to Sam Ka Tsuen Ferry Pier for another epic adventure.
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All aboard!
Lei Yue Mun
If you arrive by ferry, you’ll be greeted by a typhoon shelter filled with fishing boats and pleasurecraft. On one side are the hulking industrial blocks and mushrooming apartment towers of Yau Tong; on the other, the tin roofed village houses and rooftop neon signs of Lei Yue Mun, an 18th century Hakka mining settlement that has become a renowned seafood destination. Though there’s a fairly conventional promenade along the typhoon shelter, the real destination here is the shoreline accessible by plunging into the narrow lanes of the old village.
What we love: This is where you’ll find the last remaining natural beach on Victoria Harbour. Tucked between the old village and the Lei Yue Mun Lighthouse — a small beacon perched atop a rocky outcrop — the beach offers a spectacular view of the entire harbour. Bring your picnic blanket and a beach umbrella and you’ll be treated to a very memorable sunset.
What needs work: Recent renovation works have added a series of viewing platforms to the Lei Yue Mun harbourfront. In theory, they’ve increased the amount of public space along the water. But in practice, they’re fussily over-designed, with too many decorative elements that block the view and not enough practical amenities like places to sit.
Photo courtesy HK Government Information Services Department
Cha Kwo Ling
Not far from the soon-to-be-redeveloped squatter village of Cha Kwo Ling is one of Hong Kong’s newest harbourfront spaces, which opened in 2023. The Cha Kwo Ling Promenade is a two-hectare open space built atop a sewage pumping station, with several patches of grass and one of the city’s biggest playgrounds, with an eight-metre-tall rope net climbing structure, slides, treehouses, a maze and a splashpad.
What we love: This is as family-friendly as it gets — and it isn’t quite as crowded as the epic harbourfront playground in Sai Ying Pun.
What needs work: Though we appreciate there are some small lawns, the proportion of hard-paved to grassy areas feels completely out of whack. As is often the case, the lack of any food or drink stalls means you’d better pack your own lunch — especially since the space is fairly disconnected from its surroundings.
Kai Tak
Hong Kong’s iconic airport has given way to an enormous mixed-use development with one of the longest waterfront promenades anywhere in Hong Kong. Stretching for more than seven kilometres around the airport’s old runway and the adjacent Kai Tak Typhoon Shelter, the Kai Tak Promenade is still a work in progress, as the urban development next to it is still a ways from completion. But it’s already a destination for runners and cyclists — Kai Tak is one of the only cycle-friendly areas in Kowloon — and there are several clusters of harbourfront bars, restaurants and retail spaces under development.
What we love: The section of harbourfront next to the Kai Tak Stadium is particularly open and inviting, with space for restaurants and bars — though still mostly unoccupied — and plenty of room for events. There is also a lot of public seating, including steps leading down to the water, and some interesting landscape features like a reflecting pool that mimics the layout of the old airport.
It’s also worth noting that there are several lawns alongside the promenade, and rather than a big fence that obstructs the view, there is a more discreet wire barrier. We also like that the promenade seems well integrated into the adjacent residential areas that are currently under construction, with no big roadways separating built-up areas from the water.
What needs work: We’re hesitant to be too critical, given that Kai Tak is still several years away from being fully built and inhabited. That said, long stretches of the promenade are fairly uninteresting. Whether that changes depends entirely on how Kai Tak evolves as a neighbourhood.
To Kwa Wan
There’s a gap between the Kai Tak Promenade and its neighbour in To Kwa Wan, but a short walk inland will bring you to the Kowloon City Ferry Pier and the Ma Tau Kok Public Pier — two surprisingly stylish structures that speaks to the understated elegance of Hong Kong’s mid-century public works.
From there, a covered canopy leads to one of the most unusual spots on Victoria Harbour: the Fishtail Rock, the reason for whose name will become immediately obvious as soon as you set eyes on the unique geological formation. Originally the focal point of an island called Hoi Sham that was renowned for its good feng shui — a temple once stood underneath the rock — the whole area became a public park after the island was absorbed by the mainland through land reclamation.
What we love: Hoi Sham Park has a vintage 1960s vibe, with an amphitheatre and a Chinese-style pavilion extending out into the harbour, with a view of both the Fishtail Rock and the sea. The park was recently extended with a lawn and an attractively landscaped promenade leading towards Hung Hom.
What needs work: Fences. Fences and walls everywhere. Like many older green spaces managed by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department, Hoi Sham Park is a maze of ugly, obtrusive barriers lining every path, blocking views of the greenery and the harbour. Luckily, the park’s recently built extension is more open and spacious.
Hung Hom
The roughly 2.3 kilometres of promenades that wrap around Hung Hom and Whampoa are a lesson in the very uneven evolution of Hong Kong’s harbourfront. In the east, a few large industrial buildings block the way between the Hoi Sham Park extension and the large Laguna Verde housing estate. Then there’s an unremarkable stretch of promenade built in the 1990s, followed by the Hung Hom ferry piers, next to which is a newly opened park built on the site of a former bus terminus. Beyond that is a recently revamped stretch of promenade, culminating in an elevated walkway spanning a railyard — as well as a former railway freight pier that has been leased to a mainland Chinese event company that will turn it into a harbourfront event space. It’s a big hodgepodge.
What we love: There are some rare seaview terraces along this stretch of harbourfront, including free public seating outside the Kerry Hotel’s food hall — an above-ground space well connected to the harbourfront by a staircase and escalator. The promenade to the west of the ferry pier was once rather uninspiring, with a truly hideous white metal fence and very little public seating, but it has been recently revamped with more places to hang out and a better-looking barrier along the water.
The newly opened Hung Hom Urban Park, on the site of the former ferry pier bus terminus, is a family-oriented play space with plenty of room for kids to run around; there’s even a life-sized model fire truck that echoes the fireboat across the water in Quarry Bay Park.
What needs work: The entire stretch from Laguna Verde to the Hung Hom piers is perfunctorily designed, with very few places to sit; it’s a space to pass through and not linger. To the west, the newly refurbished promenade is certainly better looking than what existed before, but there are some odd design choices, like sculptural benches that face away from the water.
It’s hard to say how the new event space on the former rail freight pier will shape up. Can we hope for something that’s less Night Vibes and more Bangkok night market?
Tsim Sha Tsui
This is by far the most visited stretch of harbourfront in Hong Kong and it’s easy to see why. It’s packed with attractions, including the film-themed Avenue of Stars, the Hong Kong Museum of Art (HKMoA) and the Cultural Centre. Two large hotel, retail and entertainment complexes — Victoria Dockside and Harbour City — are directly connected to the harbourfront. The Star Ferry Pier offers a direct connection to Central and Wan Chai. And the view is incredible: it’s exactly what is depicted on countless postcards, and no less spectacular for it.
That wasn’t always the case. 15 years ago, the Avenue of Stars and adjacent Salisbury Garden were a civic embarrassment. Here was Hong Kong’s most iconic stretch of harbourfront, yet what greeted visitors was a narrow walkway clad in cheap materials and lined by tatty theme park kiosks selling overpriced squid balls. Making matters worse, the HKMoA and Cultural Centre both turned their back on their harbour, with the street-level experience consisting of blank walls. Salisbury Garden was a cloistered enclave of sun-bleached pavement and dull shrubbery from which you couldn’t see the harbour.
And to make things even worse, all pedestrian crossings on Salisbury Road were closed in 2003, rerouting people into a rat’s warren of underground tunnels. TST and the harbour were effectively cut off from each other.
Everything changed in 2017, when a five-year renovation of the TST harbourfront was completed. Led by American landscape architect James Corner and his firm Field Operations, the project completely rebuilt the Avenue of Stars, making it wider, with a more curvaceous design, higher-quality finishings and more seating options. Salisbury Garden was opened up with a lawn, amphitheatre-style steps overlooking the water and a new layout that draws people from Salisbury Road to the water. A few years later, the HKMoA was renovated and expanded, adding room for harbour-facing retail. Around the same time, years of community advocacy paid off and the government reinstated two surface crossings on Salisbury Road.
All of these changes have made a huge difference. In fact, we almost included the TST harbourfront in our list of Hong Kong’s best — but there was something holding us back. Read on to find out what it was.
What we love: There’s so much stuff to do. Want to get a baijiu cocktail? There’s a guy selling those out of a kiosk in the new-and-improved Salisbury Garden. Want to sit outdoors with a coffee or wine? Hit up the pavilion at the eastern end of the Avenue of Stars, which has a rooftop and large terrace, or settle into the spacious patio outside the renovated HKMoA. Want to just chill? Sit on the steps in Salisbury Garden or outside the Cultural Centre and let your eyes feast on the view. The lawn at Salisbury Garden is especially nice at night, because James Corner left it deliberately unlit: all the better to appreciate the ambient lights of the city around you.
In addition to the skyline, this is a very lively part of Hong Kong and with so much hustle and bustle, there are endless opportunities for people watching.
What needs work: There’s one big problem with the TST harbourfront: it’s too popular. The crowds can be overwhelming. Most of the visitors do not live in Hong Kong, which gives the whole area tourist trap vibes, even if it’s actually a worthwhile space. Because of the tourists, there are more and more touts aggressively hawking illegal harbour tours on private boats. If you’re lucky, this stretch of harbour will be pleasantly bustling. But if you arrive at the wrong time, like during one of the mainland’s golden week holidays, be prepared for a crush of humanity.
On a related note, while the restoration of two surface crossings on Salisbury Road is very welcome, it isn’t enough. The volume of people walking between TST and the harbourfront is enough that the fairly narrow crosswalks need to be enlarged — think Shibuya Crossing levels of improvement.
We also need to talk about Harbour City. Though it’s technically possible to walk along the harbour next to this iconic shopping centre, you’re shunted onto a narrow footpath next to carpark entrances and a busy roadway. Something needs to be done about that.
Tai Kok Tsui
This roughly one-kilometre promenade near Olympic MTR station highlights one of the biggest problems with the Kowloon harbourfront: it’s disjointed and disconnected. Cut off from West Kowloon by the cargo working area of the Yau Ma Tei typhoon shelter, and from the Cheung Sha Wan harbourfront promenade by industrial and cargo facilities, few people are likely to visit this particular space unless they happen to live nearby. But curious visitors will be rewarded by some remarkable views of Hong Kong Island and Stonecutters Island, plus a surprising new space.
What we love: A couple of years ago, the existing promenade was extended to the west with the Hoi Fai Road Playable Space, part of the new generation of harbourfront spaces that are meant to be fun, comfortable and flexible places to hang out. There are quirky playground installations like a see-saw underneath a reflective canopy and a set of swings installed beneath giant spherical lanterns. There are also some bar-style seating areas where you can have a drink while gazing out at the harbour, though you’ll have to bring your own — there are no retail outlets nearby.
What needs work: The government has invested a lot to improve this stretch of harbourfront in recent years, adding comfortable public seating, more greenery and a new children’s playground. There are a few grassy areas and plenty of other places to sit. And yet it’s just kind of dull. You should be able to get a coffee or have lunch somewhere along here, but most of the adjacent buildings meet the promenade with blank walls. It’s a perfect example of how great spaces are defined as much by what’s around them as by what’s in the space itself.