Suburbia: Cultural difference

Moving from a dense city to a semi suburbs was a big change for me. The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) is a unified government, with no local jurisdictions (such as cities or towns). However, there are four broad regions and within each there are districts, are designated for statistical purposes. Hong Kong is the most transit-dependent major metropolitan areas in the high-income world. Mass transit carries 72 percent of motorized trips. Even with the high residential and employment density, the average work trip is approximately five miles each way. Moreover, despite having one of the most effective mass transit systems in the world and extraordinarily high densities, the average one-way work trip travel time is 46 minutes, 18 minutes longer than Los Angeles or Houston. Hong Kong’s current population of 7.07 million is projected to grow to 8.47 million by 2041, with most of the city’s “suburban sprawl” taking place in the densely populated New Territories to the north of the old Hong Kong Island and Kowloon districts.