Hong Kong deploys extra staff as revamped Huanggang Port sees over 150,000 daily trips over long weekend

Hong Kong’s revamped Huanggang Port checkpoint has logged over 150,000 trips in a single day over the Chung Yeung Festival long weekend, facing its first real stress test since opening last week.

Authorities deployed additional personnel to cope with the holiday rush, after Secretary for Security Chris Tang said that the control point would log more than 100,000 daily trips across the border over the three-day weekend.

The rebuilt checkpoint adopts a new “Collaborative Inspection and Joint Clearance” model.

This means passengers only need to queue up once for document inspection and identity verification through either automated channels or at staffed counters, where Hong Kong and mainland officials will work side by side to complete both immigration procedures.

According to Immigration Department figures, trips peaked on Sunday, with 77,166 departures and 74,902 arrivals — 152,068 boundary crossings in total. Some 87 per cent of the departures were Hong Kong residents and 12 per cent were mainland visitors.

Among arrivals, 86 per cent were Hong Kong residents and 10 per cent were mainland visitors.

Contingencies

In a Sunday statement, the Security Bureau said that outbound passenger flows had increased significantly since that morning.

“During the peak hour between 1pm and 2pm, as many as 9,728 outbound passenger trips were recorded within one hour,” it said.

The Immigration Department “immediately opened all clearance channels and counters at the departure hall on L5 to expedite passenger flow, and implemented crowd diversion and control measures on L2 and L5 in collaboration with the Police.”

Authorities also said that the waiting time inside the departure hall remained below 30 minutes after the expedited measures.

On Saturday, the facility logged 130,364 total trips, including 55,703 arrivals and 74,661 departures. Monday saw 116,667 trips – 78,968 arrivals and 37,699 departures.

In a video on the Immigration Department’s Instagram page on Monday afternoon, Lok Ma Chau Deputy Division Commander Yung Ka-wai said that a large number of Hong Kong residents were entering the city through the port, increasing passenger traffic in the arrivals hall.

Between 2pm and 4pm, about 9,401 passengers arrived in Hong Kong via Huanggang Port, according to a Monday statement.

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James Lee is a reporter at Hong Kong Free Press with an interest in culture and social issues. He graduated with a bachelor’s degree in English and a minor in Journalism from the Chinese University of Hong Kong, where he witnessed the institution’s transformation over the course of the 2019 extradition bill protests and after the passing of the Beijing-imposed security law.

Since joining HKFP in 2023, he has covered local politics, the city’s housing crisis, as well as landmark court cases including the 47 democrats national security trial. He was previously a reporter at The Standard where he interviewed pro-establishment heavyweights and extensively covered the Covid-19 pandemic and Hong Kong’s political overhauls under the national security law.