Cross-border infrastructure fuels visitors to Hong Kong for November

Nearly 6 million tourists visited Hong Kong in November, 2018, up around 20 percent year-on-year.

It was a huge growth due to cross-border infrastructure, namely Hong Kong section of Guangzhou-Shenzhen-Hong Kong Express Rail Link and Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge, said the Hong Kong Tourism Board.

According to data from HKTB, total visitor arrivals reached 58.56 million from January to November last year, up 10 percent from the same period in 2017. In the same stretch, visitor arrivals from the Chinese mainland made a 14.2 percent increase, from 40 million in 2017 to 46 million last year.

To facilitate tourists, cross-border buses were arranged at Zhuhai port of Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge to take them to downtown Causeway Bay without stop.

"Cross-border high speed railway and bridge boost Hong Kong's tourism with an increasing growth of visitors to Hong Kong," said Paul Chan, the financial secretary of China's Hong Kong Special Administrative Region government.

"The total visitor arrivals to Hong Kong in 2018 is expected to exceed 60 million, a hit of record since 2014," he added.