MTR has said that the Hong Kong section of the XRL rail link will be delayed until late 2018.
The Guangzhou-Hong Kong-Shenzhen Express Rail Link was due to open at the end of 2017 and had already suffered a delay due to flooding in the tunnels.
Addressing the media, Secretary for Transport and Housing Professor Anthony Cheung Bing-leung said the cost of the line’s 26-kilometre Hong Kong section was also being revised up from HKD $71.52 billion to $83.2 billion, including a $2.1 billion contingency.
Cheung said the government had “grave concern” about seeing the project’s original $65 billion budget go up by more than 30 per cent.
“The government has serious concern about the drastic deviations of the project from the original commissioning schedule and approved funding,” said Cheung.
“We will critically examine the performance of the MTR Corporation as the project manager and look into its responsibility for project delay and cost overrun.”
The Chinese section of the line, which is already complete, will operate services at 350 km/h, compared to 200 km/h on the Hong Kong section.
They must be using the same contractors New York City’s MTA insists on funding.