“Please use Pedestrian crossing ahead”: but the crossing is presently neither zebra nor signalled, and requires crossing four lanes of the high-speed Concorde Road

Inland Revenue’s new public building in Kai Tak will get a signalised pedestrian crossing near its Concorde Road entrance after questions were raised over pedestrian safety in accessing the new tax offices.

Transport Department (TD) today said one of the Concorde Road non-signalised crossings “is being upgraded to signalised pedestrian crossing”, with work expected to be completed by the end of this month or within February 2023 at the latest.

A TD spokeswoman also says the new commercial building AIRSIDE will soon provide a 24-hour public passageway connection through a footbridge connecting Kai Tak MTR Exit C, AIRSIDE, Trade and Industry Tower and the Inland Revenue Centre.

For pedestrians, deviating to use the signalled pedestrian crossing will add only about 130 metres to the journey from the MTR station while the bridge route will add about 250 metres, although most of that would be covered or even air-conditioned.

Transit Jam had visited the building ahead of its opening last week and found pedestrians visiting from the MTR station would need to cross a dangerous four-lane road with no zebra crossing or pedestrian signal crossing, despite Inland Revenue’s claims of “easy access”.

Inland Revenue Department (IRD) had said the design of pedestrian access was “outside IRD’s purview”. But pedestrians were having difficulty crossing the fast road, with a steady stream of drivers refusing to give way to those on foot and construction vehicles blocking other crossings.

The area is plagued by dangerous driving and heavy construction trucks: a woman was killed in August this year by a dump truck crash at the exact unsignalled Concorde Road crossing pedestrians are currently advised to use.