Part I is here. It is the AI summary of the January 2026 Notice from HKRI.
My own comments (Peter Forsythe, member Siena One VOC):
The main concern from those against the proposal seems to be safety.
I will focus my comments on the safety issue.
1. "There are no Solutions. Only Trade-Offs". We can have more convenience, but it will impact safety. The only way to have complete safety is with no traffic at all; but that means zero convenience. We do not expect, as Discovery Bay, or as Hong Kong, that we have 100% safety, with 100% convenience. We trade off the convenience of having traffic, against a higher accident (= lower safety) rate.
2. Safety vs Convenience. We have accepted, in DB, a higher safety risk for the benefit of having more convenience. I doubt DB residents today would want to give up the tunnel, the buses and the North Plaza taxi rank. Even those who were very much against all these things when they were proposed.
3. Are taxis worth the risk? The current debate is whether the extra safety risk of increasing the number of taxis circulating in DB is worth the extra convenience, especially to the elderly, caregivers, late-night travellers, etc....
4. Safety in Numbers: Hong Kong is a safe place to travel.
According to the Hong Kong Transport Department and other international data, Hong Kong’s fatality rate per 100,000 population is significantly lower than many other urban hubs.
| City | Road Traffic Fatalities (per million population) |
|---|---|
| (2024) | ~11.7 (1.17 per 100k) |
| (2024) | 25 |
| (2024) | 27 |
| (2024) | 31 |
| (2024) | 32 |
| (2023) | 46 |
| (2023) | 86 |
More here.
Reference figures:
- Hong Kong population (2024): 7,534,200
- Discovery Bay population (2021): 19,336 (= 0.25% of Hong Kong)
- Vehicles in Hong Kong (2024): 808,771
- Vehicles in DB: 2,700 (= 0.33% of Hong Kong)
- Accidents (2024): 17,189. 2% of total vehicles (trend is downward)
- Fatalities (2024): 83.
From the Reference figures:
- Accidents in DB: 56 per year, ~ 5/month
- Fatalities in DB: 0.21 per year, ~ 1 every 5 years.
[Note: I don't know the actual figures. If anyone does, could they let me know and I'll update]
Question now:
How much will allowing taxis to deliver door-to-door in DB, increase the traffic in DB?
And how much will that increase in traffic affect the increase in risk?
It seems to me likely that they number of taxis per day may not increase substantially. Instead it is likely that the taxis currently dropping off in North Plaza may go elsewhere in DB. How many of them may do this, I don't know. Perhaps there's an estimate from the PLG or DBSML.
Let's assume: taxis going internal to DB, as opposed to dropping off in North Plaza is 50%. The total daily traffic is 2,700, made up of delivery vans, taxis and other commercial vehicles. My guess is that half of the total are taxis. So...
Guesstimate: total taxis per day: 1,350 (half of 2,700).
Of which half go into DB internal: 675.
Assume the same accident rate as above Reference: 2%.
Extra accidents in DB per year: ~13. Or ~ 1 per month.
Extra deaths from car accidents in DB: one more every 1,700 years. Or thereabouts.
I'm sure that there are figures relating to total vehicles and total taxis in DB that I've got wrong. If anyone knows them let me know.
However, I doubt I've underestimated them.
The question then becomes:
Is it worth the extra convenience for those DB residents identified in the Proposal, to have an increased safety risk as above?
And also: how to measure "convenience"? Will there be people, perhaps the elderly, saved by having access to a taxi? I suspect so, but can't guess the number.
Overall, it seems to me that the increased risk of taxis allowed into DB internal is relatively small.
By the way: the traffic safety risk seems to be getting smaller over Hong Kong, a trend that will presumably hold true in DB as well: "Hong Kong fatal road accidents down 58% despite more cars" China Daily, 18 February, 2025.
