Hong Kong is a vertical city. Of its 1,100 sq.km., of land mass, only 25% is flat enough to build something on it. Therefore, Hong Kong’s seven million people are crammed into 250 sq. km, resulting in a population density of 28,000 per sq.km.. In order to accommodate Hong Kong’s population, buildings are erected to the skies, which means that Hong Kong people spend a lot of time, moving up and down via escalators and lifts.
The etiquette for using escalators and lifts is relatively simple: get in and out, on and off as fast as possible. This manifests itself in various ways depending on the type of people mover.
Escalators are pretty dangerous pieces of machinery. But people here tend to ignore the dangers and instead concentrate on benefits of moving quickly. Those that don’t wish to climb an escalator tend to ride on the right, as recommended. Climbers, like myself are given free rein to walk on the left. The main issue, as is common here, is getting on in the first place. This sometimes requires queuing, and giving way, something that Hong Kong people are terrible at doing. This is made worse by women, who never climb escalators because: they can’t physically climb/descend, are carrying too much, are talking too much, or are scared of walking up (and particularly down) an escalator. The latter foible usually relates to a scary incident when they were young, or the sight of a moving walkway confuses them. Either way, when a women approaches an escalator there can be a several second delay as she steadiest herself, before getting on board or alighting. These delays, cause a domino effect, particularly during rush hours.
I’ve compiled a list the top escalators around town: fastest and shortest – the one leading to and from the Kowloon Tong MTR near the supermarket Taste; shapeliest – the curved escalator at Seibu in Times Square; longest (indoors) – Fortress Hill MTR station; longest (outdoors) – Central Mid-Levels beats Ocean Park by 4x. Experimenting with the fastest escalator, I have discovered that it travels at a twice the recommended speed of an escalator – which apparently is 90 feet a minute.
The photo taken at a Japanese supermarket called Uny in Tai Koo Shing, is an escalator, only it’s for shopping trolleys. For those poor unfortunates that can’t handcarry their shopping to their car, simply load your trolley after paying and stick it into the groves at the top of the escalator, and accompany the load on a separate escalator for humans. Then trundle the trolley to the car. The trolley escalator is two way, so you are supposed to bring the trolley back and stick it in the up escalator. However, as is the way of Hong Kong, very few people do this. Just to highlight how stupid the supermarket thinks its patrons are, there are masses of signs, lights and instructions including one explaining that the trolley escalator is not for use by humans, you should not leave your umbrella hanging from the trolley handle, and, bizarrely, don’t leave your child in the trolley.
