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agreed asking local politicians to give up power if futile and there is a story about a guy coming from Taiwan to hong kong getting stopped at border but pointed out that according to the party china and taiwan are the same country, so why do you need a visa/passport to trave between 2 cities in same country built to improve trade so why customs controls?
I would say an 80 percent increase in cost, an eroding island, and poorly located immigration connections makes it all three - technical, engineering and bureaucratic.
Yes, I have visited HK multiple times and taken the Ferry. They are efficient and the terminus is conveniently located right in TST on the HK side. I don't remember as much about the Macau side, but that immigration was quick and I was in the city in minutes. The bridge is more symbolic than anything else right now.
If you've ever been to Hong Kong, you'll know that only the super rich own private cars. Space is at such a premium in Hong Kong, that owning a parking spot is seen often as an extreme expense that no one would want to own. So a bridge that relies on car traffic out of Hong Kong, is just ridiculous.
@@f430ferrari5 Ferries are more convenient, cheaper, and arguably faster, since no matter what, all those forms still need to undergo customs check, the biggest barrier. The only thing that would have been faster and cheaper is if the put in a railway on the bridge, which they didn't. So basically the only people who would use it are those rich enough to buy cars. In other words, like most Chinese mega projects, it was solely a vanity project started by the rich, created for the rich, used only by the rich, and paid for by public taxes. So business as usually for a government.
@@darkevilazn you missed the part where it’s not easy loading heavy luggage and items via the ferries. This is where the alternative helps. It don’t matter if it’s for the rich either. The poor or middle class is probably benefiting from lighter traffic. In the US there are toll roads or short cuts. Same difference. Only the rich would pay but it still lightens up traffic.
Car ownership is quite common among regular ppl in HK and ShenZhen, and of course I'm talking about normal cars like Toyota, Honda, VW, etc. The super rich you referring to own exotic cars.
A technicality here, Macau drives on the left (steering wheel on the right) just like Hong Kong, so your comment at 7:11 is incorrect. The scenario is more like this, you start off in Macau driving on the left, once you exited the Macau zone past immigration, the lanes switch to the right as the territory in the middle of the sea belongs to China. Lanes continue to the on the right through the tunnels until you approach the HK immigration around the HK airport and once you pass immigration the lanes go back to the left.
Firstly, how is it beautiful, when there isn't any outstanding or unique architectural feature? Secondly. how does being "beautiful" negate the fact that it is underused and a fiscal failure?
@@huaiwei Beautiful the Length and design..The Bridgeis for ever..Billions not even born yet will use it...Fiscally who cares how much it costs...it still costs a lot less than many other Infrastructural projects
near double cost over 10 years is not an example of those costs "spiraling out of control". London, Millenium dome: initial budget 100 million GBP, final cost: ~ 900 million GBP, THAT'S an example of an 'out of control' cost blowout.
Anyone with a wit of common sense knows a project this size will attract graft, overruns, mismanagement, engineering snafus, etc.... so, they trick the public into accepting the project by underestimating the cost to build and once it is underway the costs escalate but, they are too far into it to stop construction... everyone just accepts the enormous cost overruns and move on.... it happens all the time... just look at California's high-speed rail system that still has barely gotten off the ground after over 15 years not a single mile of rail is finished and it started out as a $9B project and estimates now have ballooned up from $88-$122B to complete... we all know those figures will be more than doubled when it is finished... probably half that is graft, inflation, and inefficiency... and my bet, the project, though not nearly as challenging as the Hong Kong bridge, will have just as many if not more problems to contend with after it is completed.
@@philiprice7875 Indeed, when Crossrail was first proposed it was stated that trains would only run as far as Maidenhead, which seemed stupid. But it kept the projected cost down to allow authorisation. In practice they had electrified beyond Maidenhead to Reading, the natural target, well before Crossrail was complete!
Typical ccp 50 cent army post. What has California rail to do with the underused bridge in china? People in US fly or drive rail is not needed to transport people.
Really insightful video. Makes me wonder why the commuter journey, including all the immigration procedures, weren't thought through while the bridge was being built. My family took the bus from the HKIA terminal to Macau some years back. The bridge was extremely impressive! Hope that things get sorted out and the bridge can be put to good use to link up the three cities.
the bridge is of good use, it s used by thousands of local people everyday. it s just that the ferries are very efficient and a lot of people don't use the bridge as the only way for travel. but bridge itself is a very good way for travel too.
Watched a video in which the Chinese people said they wouldn't use the bridge because they thought it might be 'Tofu Dreg' and don't get them started on the tunnel.
To make this a succes: 1 abolish all border controls (It's all in China after all), 2 Allow all cars left or right hand to drive in Hongkong and China ,3 make it free to use.
I am a hongkonger,and when I was on the plane about to take off,I saw the bridge and there was like only 10 cars,trucks and buses in the span of 5 minutes
It seems like they will have to switch left-driving Hong-Kong to right-driving. Then reduce bureaucracy for both private and business vehicles. Minimise toll tarifs; to match perceived benefits to cost in the minds of users.
The proposed shorter Zhongshan/Shenzhen bridge is going to be hugely successful. There will be some kind of 'border' control (it's an authoritarian country) but nothing like the Zhuhai Bridge. I've Hong Kong many times, but I've only been through Shenzhen on the train. (I remember when it was a small city and it was mostly farms all the way to Guangzhou.) I've also been in Zhongshan about 40km from Macau, but I've never been to Macau -- too much effort to see... casinos? The hundred kilometers in the other directions -- Tashan County? I've been all over. One would think that the PRC government as proof of its dominion over Macau and Hong Kong would've eliminated border controls. So who did the investors/owners/operators of the Zhuhai Bridge piss off in Beijing that none of these purely bureaucratic have been resolved? Left hand drive cars still banned in Hong Kong? The pragmatic issue is likely a concern that already congested Hong Kong could be overwhelmed by incoming traffic. (In most places I know of there're no laws against having an opposite side steering whee because it isn't a problem. Many US Postal Services delivery vehicles have right side steering wheels. )
the most significant issue was the immigration implementation.. you needed to have both immigration from hongkong & immigration upon reaching macao.. the ferry immigration was troublesome already.. but the immigration thru the bridge was worst, on both sides.. if this issue can be addressed, then more people will be encouraged using the bridge.. its cheaper & faster than the ferry route
2023 est for Interstate 5 Columbia River bridge replacement is $6.3B & I don't think that includes the bells and whistles that would be stupid not to include... although, whatever is decided, it will undoubtedly simply be feeding into one of Portland Oregon's freeway crawl zones. What's goin' on with the Three Gorge's dam?... has it busted (again?) or not? Okay, back to the show... thanks for sharing, gracias
! The border control points exist whichever route is taken when travel to any of the three cities. Also, the HSR rail connection between Hong Kong and Shenzhen is barely 40 Kms long. This "mocumentary" would appear to be too full of selective misinformation.
New York has a parallel failure in the new Tappan Zee. The opportunity to add a rail line, even a light rail line linking Nyack and the Northern tip of Manhattan was a wicked waste. At least their is a walkway
No need for rail train on tappan zee bridge. There is the Amtrak rail interconnecting NY counties and to other states. There is also the subway system for NY City borough's interconnection.
It's funny to see some negative comments here. China built it becasue she can. It's built for China, not for outsiders. The bridge is built and set for 2047. No need to worry and concern. If it's a failure, Chinese can deal with it.
Given time, these costs would not matter as costs of construction increases, such structure can never be build in future. As for driving by laws, that can be changed, small problem.
Similar to many other public infrastructure projects in China and other parts of the world, economics / financial return of the project is usually not the top concern for the government. This is particularly true for HZMB, with its huge scale and potical significance, helping enhance physical connection between the mainland China and its two SARs. Further on the horizon, there are huge new towns under development / planning on both Macao and Hong Kong side of the bridge which would drive up usage.
Alright, I can give an updated comment as I just went last week. So, lotta comments as well as the video in general are correct. It's a technical marvel, it is desperately underused (I timed a car every 10 or so seconds during my crossing on the bus). It would have succeeded more with a train, or at least better connecti9n with a train. However another comment is also correct - a lot of it is down to the current border system. If vehicles were allowed to cross freely it'd definitely be used far more. You realistically need 3 number plates currently, HK, Macau, Chinese (I saw a Tesla with exactly that!) to fully make use of the bridge. It's slso clearly made with a thought to serve mainlanders and commercial traffic to get to HK via Macau, less HK'ers to visit Macau For that It has advantages to the ferry especially if you are commercial as it connects nicely near the port area. Also I noticed in terms of people, the flow is actually not that bad - but they are all on buses due to the private vehicle restrictions. It's still not that much compared to what they built it for. In all it feels like it could still work yet with some tweaks. particularly on the political/border front and being better integrated to the rail system for passenger use on the HK side. I'm pretty sure in time usage will increase as China integrates it's SARs more politically. But the cost of maintenance as well as the size of the border facilities in the meantime really makes you think that they did miscalculate the present. Conclusion: I'd say its a failure. I'd drop the colossal. I'd add watch this space.
You would think that the people involved of this project would take all of the troubles in mind before you start digging. I GUESS NO ONE BOTHERED TO CHECK OUT THE LOGISTICS AT ALL. WOW What a waste.
I think you miss the point. This bridge is preparation for the end of "one country, two systems". Then there won't be any immigration or customs checks at all, and one weekend HK is going to switch from left to right side of the road driving. If you think that sounds fanciful, Sweden managed to achieve this in a single weekend. Even if the treaty is honoured it's only 24 years away. I suspect that there will be a "referendum" before then though.
The Chinese doesn't worry about profitability of a mega project like Westerners do. They view it as long term investment and they are happy with the indirect benefits to the nation's economy which may be estimated but rarely measured.
How does someone propose and then go ahead with the construction of a car-focused bridge between cities whitch use left and right hand drive? They built a bridge to allow people to drive between cities yet you literally cannot drive there. That's just crazy.
The bridge is not the first port of entry between mainland China and Hong Kong. Thousands of cars are traveling between the borders everyday and there is no problems. You are just being misinformed.
Bad planning seems to be its downfall, apart from the corruption in construction. Best thing they could do is put a rail track down one of the lanes each way.
any investment that even has the smallest taste of brittish influence will go down by protectionism of one of the former partners like in this case hong kong
It’s not a failure! The target was to USE the money from the Hong Kong government which paid most of the cost
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Costs overrun is normal... It's because of public tenders for such investments. The companies will claim lower costs just to win, then will find unexpected issues requiring more money. The real and only issue is bureaucracy. In Poland right steering wheel cars were forbidden too, but then one day they decided, what a heck, let's allow them. And guess what? Nothing really happened, the wrong side wheel cars are still micro minority. Plus some permissions to cross the bridge? Wtf?! Resources wasted by bureaucracy.
Immigration delays can be streamlined, but the omission of high speed rail is a huge oversight. This bridge looks like another grandiose project that has become a very expensive white elephant.
China is not the only nation on earth to have built expensive white elephants. It is common to just about any country that can afford to chuck billions away on them.
I am a Chinese from Hong Kong. i do not think the comments in the video are all fair. Hong Kong is part of China. Due to the remanent of colonialism, some Hong Kong people are still unduly critical of anything involving mainland China under Western influence, which are mostly politically biased against mainland China. The result is a small section who claim to represent "Hong Kong people" rushed in to offer farfetched criticisms which turned out to be unfounded. (1) Environmental issues had been fully studied before works began. 5 years after the completion of the bridge, the Chinese white dolphins in the area are now alive and well with no evidence that they are affected by the bridge. (2) The border custom issue has been resolved by allowing all immigration checks be done on one side of the border. This is the same as in High High-Speed railway station in HK, which incredibly met with drummed up objection from some "legal experts" with reasons all rejected by the Court. (3) The bridge was built by Hong Kong and mainland China, with each other responsible for their own section. Delay and increase in budget was not due to corruption, but incessant judicial reviews (which all failed) raised by politically charged individuals seeking to halt the works altogether. The delay of some 2 years was entirely on the Hong Kong section, and most of the increased budget was born by Hong Kong citizens as a result. (4) The lack of railway is not an "oversight". In order to minimize the long-term environmental impact, and prolong the life of the bridge, it was designed to wind left and right at various points in order to accommodate the ocean flows. Such design over great length was simply impractical for high-speed railway. (5) The design life of the bridge is not 40 years. It is 100 years. In its first year of opening, it met a signal 10 typhoon (the strongest I ever saw) without suffering a scratch (6) The point of building the bridge was not to make a profit, but to promote the economy of the Greater Bay Area which has great potential. This was delayed in large part due to Covid 19 during which led mainland China to reduce access of its border to Hong Kong for 3 years. (7) Starting from 1st July 2023 Hong Kong cars can drive directly to Zhuhai via the bridge under a much-simplified permit application system with minimum costs over compulsory insurance (about US$100 for one year). I applied for mine in late June and got my permit last week. It took about 2 weeks waiting for the application to be processed on the internet and one tour to a designated garage for car examination. I am excited about my first self-drive over the bridge tomorrow (13th July) to Zhuhai - for some great food, sight-seeing, and a possible hop over to Macau - all in a day return trip comfortably from home. Many ask why China can progress so fast in the past 40 years. One of the answers is it invests in infrastructure early which to the capitalists would appear to be a "colossal failure". The success of China is the best retort.
The worst problem is that both immigration checkpoints in Hong Kong and Macau are based on the very edge of the cities, while ferry terminals are located at the heart of both cities, if you include the travel time to the immigration checkpoints at both sides, the trip will take longer than going by ferry.
@@simonMcCartney-rh7nt They figured out a way to make money from the bridge, open up the Chinese border for Hong Kong vehicles to enter into China. Now they're making so much money that recouping the construction cost is within reach.
Pre-pandemic, I flew over this bridge a couple of times on the approach to Hong Kong. Beautiful bridge, but I only needed my two hands to count the number of vehicles I saw.
@@globeex My girlfriend was quizzed by Hong Kong immigration on the way back and everyone was laughing as we were about the only car they'd seen for an hour and they admitted they just wanted to look like they were doing some work.
If globeEX calls this mega project a "colossal failure" then let's have more of them!!! Meanwhile in the USA's Silicon Valley they still can't get a high speed rail link going after decades of promising; and dozens if not hundreds of US bridges across the country are thought to be at risk of collapse.This bridge linking Macau and Hong Kong is an infrastructure marvel and a phenomenal engineering feat. Well done to the planners, engineers and government officers who helped make this project go from start to finish. Economic payback for projects of this scale doesn't happen in a few short years from opening but is recouped over a far longer time horizon and the Chinese are well aware of this. In the years to come its true value will come to be realised.
It seems that a lot of consequences and potential problems were overlooked at the beginning. That's why making lists is so important. This reminds of surgeons who have left surgical instruments inside patients simply because they thought they were too smart to forget anything. Nurses solved the problem by creating checklists.
I worked on a project where the architect forgot, that to get power to the other side of the building, you had to have a travel path for cables, or perhaps he was from the future where power was wireless.
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@@boblordylordyhowiemy dad was re-creating building project, because architect forgot support beams, which resulted in door height of 1.4 meter upon adding them 😂
I once heard an American surgeon claiming that he had invented checklists - this was more than 50 years after they were introduced by the aviation industry !
It's actually the responsibility of the scrub nurse to count instruments before closing the incision. If instruments are left inside the patient, it's the nurses fault.
The very obvious, IF they wish to move freight rail makes more sense. Even moving many passengers. Equally obvious they have to get border procedures over before they leave which ever mainland. And the stupidity of spending this much money then having a ban on r/h drive vehicles,,, dumb dumb and dumber. And the insurance issues as well. That should have been sorted out with the industry well ahead of opening.
It seems incredible that such an adventurous engineering accomplishment should have been undertaken before the the consequent problems had been thrashed out.
Like any construction project you are faced with new unexpected challengers that you have to deal with and adapt to. That is literally part of building anything including basic housing.
The Hong Kong -Zhuhai-Macau bridge is a huge project . This bridge was opened in February 2018. In 2019-2020 there was riots and chaos in Hong Kong in an attempted colour revolution aimed at the Mainland Central Government. Then the thrird factor was the 2020 - 2022 disruptions of the COVID_19 pandemic across China, and the world.. The Covid-19 caused serious shut down of large parts of China including Hong Kong and Macau with travel bans only eased in February -May 2023. We are still not able to freely travel to China in June 2023 for reasons not unexpected in a recovery . All our company'd procurements had been deferred for 4 years today. In planning manufacturing investment and many serious business takes years, and then there is the testing, verification and acceptance. Today in June 2023 is quite wrong and pre-mature to assert the the Hong Kong -Zhuhai-Macau cross -sea bridge is a "colossal failure" . It has not yet begun to fight. A little more time please. In consideration of the limited space here your analysis is good nevertheless . Many thanks.
It just reminds me how blessed we are in the EU to have the visa free Schengen area which allows us to travel between all participating countries without any obstacles and delays.
@@TheSherlockk That place is not "not part of Schengen anymore" ... it has *never been* part of the Schengen area. (assuming that you are talking about the UK / Great Britain)
@@samsun01 PUTIN'S UNPROVOKED WAR HAS FAILED! The struggle against tyranny in Europe is worthwhile. Russia has failed in every one of its goals since it started this unprovoked invasion. HK's huge investment in an unused white elephant bridge is not smart, especially when China's economy is collapsing.
Well this bridge would have been a failure if this was designed with people in mind. But this is strategic investment which allows the PLA to easily reach Hong Kong in times of unrest. From the military standpoint this bridge serves its prupose well. I don't see many channels covering this from a different POV.
Don't understand, failour? Its a strategic infrastructure, linking some 70 million people all within 2-3 hours of driving distance. Pls don't be too shortsighted.
Ww had always a great time travelling on the Hong Kong Zhuhai Macao Bridge. Our friends and Relatives from other Countries were so proud and happy marveling at being on the longest Bridge in the World. And it only took around 45 minutes in a super comfortable Bus and the travel was a breeze. And Immigration doesnt take more than 2 minutes.. HZMB is truly a Marvel of this World. Great 🇨🇳
Not true about not allowing LHD in Hong Kong, they are often imported and driven. The restriction for the bridge is the difficulty of getting a permit. You have to hold a permit to use the bridge and only 3000 have been issued on the mainland.
Reckon it's more a problem of where to park their vehicles once they've arrived! Why it was never envisaged to incorporate rail-services seems rather incompetent!
It’s not a failure bc it’s construction wasn’t economically but political it was a way to show and remind HK and Macao residents that they are attached to the mainland. It’s more symbolic then anything and in this regard the bridge was a total success
Politically motivated construction of infrastructure are much more often than not a failure in itself.We've seen a lot of underutilized infrastructure in the West as well.
@@andrekoster9708 Two airports in Spain with no flights. Highways going bankrupt because nobody uses them. Train lines with less than 5% of passenger capacity...The list is very, very long. And that's only in Southern Europe.
The bridge is a symbol that China owns HK. It's also handy if China ever decides to roll tanks and troops into HK. If they were serious about public transport then they would have included a rail line on that bridge. Anyhow, I'm sure that the rich folks and the politicians enjoy the convenience of having a big, open highway to themselves.
Macau drives on the left. When I visited there, back in the early 1980s and crossed into China, the bus had to cross over to the right as it crossed the border
I was absolutely astounded to see this giant bridge in the middle of the ocean as I approached the airport during my one and only trip to Hong Kong in 2018!
I'm quite amazed at how many commenters confuse 'beautiful' and 'engineering marvel' with 'fiscally responsible' and 'good use of taxpayers money'. A Ferrari is also beautiful and useful, so why don't you buy one to go to the grocery store?
Because luxury car don’t earn you money. You can only show off with it. This bridge, along with other huge projects like HSR, are of strategic importance and is beneficial in the long run. Most people don’t understand so their countries develop much slower than china
"it is a total success, what the heck are you talking about" It was built to be a transport connection, but is so under utilised that it's success as a road bridge is being questioned. One vehicle per minute is not a success !
An overnight success would have led to over night failures in other areas which was once the route. Folks like you would never understand this. Travelers stopping by rest stop areas along that original 4 hour route would see a massive decrease in business. Same for gas stations. Sure traffic would improve in those areas but at what sacrifice. We also had Covid which restricted travel. Folks like you are just jealous haters. Part of the solution is simply just having taxis and buses shuttle back and forth. Electric? Moving traffic away from one area to another can be a good thing. It can also be a bad thing.
Do the math. The numbers do not lie. This bridge is a failure. Just because you can do or build something, doesn't mean you should. They aren't taking in nowhere near in tolls to cover the cost of upkeep on this thing. And wait until it gets hit by a worse Typhoon or cyclone. This bridge is a failure and should have never been built like a lot of Chinese mega projects.
6:50 Hong Kong and Macau are left-hand traffic, but the traffic rule including road signs on the bridge follows China's. Many Hong Kongers considered this bridge as one of the 'white elephant' projects. Which seems it is constructed concerning on political more than financial feasible. The majority section of the bridge is built by China's, private car requires special license to get on the bridge to enter the 3 places or to park at Park & Ride in Macau / Zhuhai side.
The future of transportation is with rail and not with individual cars. This should have been a primarily rail bridge and only secondarily for cars. China has developed an enormous high-speed rail network, so why did the planners fall asleep on this?
Probably because this project started in the 1980s and was planned in the 90s/2000s. The high speed rail network was only getting started then so planners were still thinking primarily about roads. Just I guess. It is a huge failure of long-term thinking, which China is usually relatively good at.
Since July 1, 2023 private cars were exempted from paying custom duties. This has led to increase in traffic with the recent Easter break having a record 19,000 cars traveling the bridge.
No colossal failure on the bridge construction and use. The colossal failure is for the video to to have proper comparison and analysis. A basic a toll highway in north America of equivalent length would cost as much if not more and the toll fees would be much higher. It would also have low traffic for a number of years until user and becomes customized to use. The left/right shifting would have to be done on regular land route as well so no disadvantage but the bridge saved many hours of commute.
The original concept was to link HK with Zhuhai and areas to the west. HK have a large shipping port and air freight facilities. The bridge would make the development of Zhuhai and beyond to be more attractive.
I've used the bridge on several occasions and although you go through 2 immigration points neither had held me up for more than a few minutes, just showed proper passport/paperwork. The use of the bridge is limited to vehicles that have a permit so mostly restricted to busses and hire limousines, although some private cars do travel between the cities (just takes longer to go through inspections).
One reason for the restrictions is because mainland China and HK drives on different sides of the road. HK also have very congested roads. Imagine if there are no restrictions and tourists were able to go to HK in their cars freely.
Takes 4 hours to drive 200km(125 miles) ... travel speed average 32 mph. Wow... they claim they have the best roads. Heh. Heh. Heh. 3000 cars at $10 makes $30000 per day, $11 million per year. Maintenance cost $80 million a year.. excellent economics. China is genius. But hey this makes their gdp rosy.... heh. Heh. Heh
In Western countries or America, such a scenario is unlikely to happen, as Western companies primarily prioritize PROFIT, no profit = no construction/no bridge. While China's infrastructure projects are consistently aimed at benefiting its people rather than maximizing profits.
The comments which are praising the beauty of the bridge need to read your logic. Just operating this structure is costing someone a lot of money, with no return on investment or recovery of the billions spent to build it. If all infrastructure projects resulted in these type of losses, a local government would be passing the burden onto its citizens - most of whom are not benefiting from the construction. Sad.
@@wyiiting8757 USA is a capitalist country where anybody can pursue their finncial dreams.. people go to business to make profit not to lose money.... just like the small Chinese businesses...what benefits can the people get, all major projects are in the losing end..... high speed railway spent $900 billion and losing $45 million per day is about 30% under utilization.. route designed for 100 trains only run 3 trains.... some can not even pay the electric bill....... this bridge has so many red tapes.... no one free to whereever they want... all these project is to rosy up the CCP's main aim.... fake GDP.... people don't have any say about it.....
@@urldroidsuperbot2139 - I doubt that the CCP watches RU-vid videos, and these channels and the viewers are merely expressing their own opinions, mostly for entertainment. As for your comment, none of us could possibly know if a Superbot is telling the true story or not - but obviously you cannot detect that this bridge appears to be a very poor business decision. 😄
@@urldroidsuperbot2139 - Ok, I must have missed your full comment. But some might think that they should consider business economics, since they have so much money... 😏
Great video but your wrong about Macau. Just like Hong Kong they drive on the left like here in the UK, not on the right. This was due to Macau being a former Portuguese colony and at that time, Portugal also drove on the left before switching to the right some years later but Macau never did follow suit.
While fun to speculate the bridge should have included a railway connection, this ignores that the added costs would have been massive - like 50% or more. Trains are heavy, so adding railway not simply compares to adding an extra, or two, road lanes - it takes much more.
We-New Orleans-have a 40km bridge over a lake-Lake Ponchatrain -it is a pretty low bridge- and the lake is not too deep-maybe not 100 feet maximum-so it is no engineering marvel-weather mild most of the time-except hurricanes-when weather is END OF WORLD BAD- All the border crossing-surprise to me-thought Hong Kong fully integrated into China-same story Macau-guess not. And folks don't expect tp drive their own car across- USA is still a car centric country-despite the cost and inconvenience-and with the green push-that might continue if the GREEN ENERGY actually becomes GREEN as in wind solar-not electricity made with methane or oil-that sure as hell is not green.
Most important the project is completed. It is all about engineering knowledge. Today, China have moved from so-called 'tofu' projects to mega infrastructure recognition all over the world. China build roads, bridges, railways even in rural areas backed up by World Bank and has lifted nearly 800 million people out of poverty after four decades.
Wait, What? CITY document "checks"? WTF. No wonder the bridge is in trouble from low use. The federal government needs to step in and simplify things - FAST.
So, there's this guy, he is really smart and has a lot of money, so anyway this guy has a company called the boring company I think. Anyway, he drills these huge tunnels underground. Look him up. Maybe he can help you.
So, we have another result of political idiocies slammed together. It would have been a nice opportunity to force Hong Kongvto drive on the right side. But no, all of a sudden the practical Chinese became impractical. And a mess resulterd.
So China considers Hong Kong and Macau as part of their sovereign territorial jurisdiction but treat those areas as international boundaries. So, China promotes separatism as they claim its sovereignty at the same time. Something will go wrong, eventually.
In the future, maybe China could stop border controls between those cities that are all officially chinese after all and stop driving left in Hong-Kong ! 😉😉
Slow ferries would be needed if a capacity of 30000 vehicles per day was planned. A big one takes roughly 500 vehicles, so let's say most of the movement happens over 15 active hours that means capacity in each direction can be served by moving 1000 vehicles per hour, so a 500 capacity ferry needs to leave every half hour. However the turnaround time would be roughly 3 hours with slow ferries so a minimum of 6 ships at roughly $250m each plus berths would be needed to provide a service that would take around 3.5 hours including loading. Smaller fast ferries would save time but would increase cost by at least a factor of 3, so not much less than the original budget for the bridge but with the disadvantage of being disrupted by even slightly bad weather.
@@mikekelly5869 This is only the status quo under the current transportation technology conditions. Considering the drive of the electrification transformation policy of China's road transportation, the future road transportation will mainly turn to electric vehicles instead of fossil energy vehicles. But electric ferries? There is no clear progress yet. From the perspective of the 30/60 carbon emission control plan promised by the country, doing so is still the right choice with huge long-term environmental value. Of course, for a small place like the UK, it is absolutely impossible to build such a huge project by itself. This mentality of saying grapes are sour instead of eating grapes is very easy to understand
@@xuesheng3635 I'm actually supporting the position of building the bridge. How is that sour grapes? By the way, I'm not British although I do live on an island so I know a thing or two about marine transportation.
That wasn't very well thought out was it. I would say it started on an engineers draught board and never took into consideration the politics or bureaucracies involved, I mean right hand left hand driven cars and then immigration, no wonder nobody uses it.
