Minutes of the 5 Meeting in 2017 of the Traffic and Transport Committee of Tai Po District Council Date: 15 September 2017 (Frid
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Minutes of the 5th Meeting in 2017 of the Traffic and Transport Committee of Tai Po District Council Date: 15 September 2017 (Friday) Time: 2:32 p.m. – 7:28 p.m. Venue: Conference Room, Tai Po District Council (“TPDC”) Present Time of Arrival Time of Withdrawal Chairman Dr. LAU Chee-sing Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Vice-chairman Mr. WOO Kin-man, Clement Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Members Mr. AU Chun-wah Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Mr. CHAN Cho-leung, MH Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Mr. CHAN Siu-kuen, MH, JP Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Mr. CHOW Yuen-wai Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Mr. KWAN Wing-yip Beginning of the meeting 5:34 p.m. Mr. LAU Yung-wai Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Mr. LI Kwok-ying, BBS, MH, JP Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Mr. LI Wah-kwong, Rex Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Mr. LI Yiu-ban, BBS, MH, JP Beginning of the meeting 5:45 p.m. Mr. LO Hiu-fung Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Mr. TAM Wing-fun, Eric, MH Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Mr. TANG Ming-tai, Patrick Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Ms. WONG Pik-kiu, BBS, MH, JP Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Mr. YAM Kai-bong, Francis Beginning of the meeting 6:55 p.m. Mr. YAM Man-chuen Beginning of the meeting 5:54 p.m. Mr. YU Chi-wing, Ken Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Co-opted Members Mr. AU Chun-ho 2:44 p.m. 5:59 p.m. Mr. CHEUNG Kwok-wah Beginning of the meeting 4:05 p.m. Mr. LAU Chung-hon 2:34 p.m. End of the meeting Mr. MO Ka-hung, Joseph Beginning of the meeting 5:47 p.m. - 2 - Mr. TSANG Hon-man Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Mr. MUI Siu-fung Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Mr. WAN Hing-choi Beginning of the meeting 5:41 p.m. Secretary Mr. LEUNG Chung-wa, Alvin Beginning of the meeting End of the meeting Executive Officer (District Council) 1 / Tai Po District Office (“TPDO”) / Home Affairs Department (“HAD”) In Attendance Mr. CHENG Chun-ping, JP TPDC Member Ms. LEE Kai-ying, Iris Assistant District Officer (Tai Po) / TPDO / HAD Mr. NGAN Wing-hong, Victor Engineer / 49 (New Territories East) / Civil Engineering and Development Department (“CEDD”) Ms. FUNG Man-ki Engineer / 5 (New Territories East) / CEDD Mr. CHAN Yau-yau, Leo Senior Transport Officer (Tai Po) / Transport Department (“TD”) Mr. WONG Kin-nam, Kenny Engineer / Tai Po 1 / TD Mr. LEE Hoo-tin Senior Engineer (Acting) / New Territories 3 / Highways Department (“HyD”) Mr. LEE Tai-kwan Engineer / New Territories 3-3 / HyD Mr. HUI Ka-kit District Engineer / Tai Po / HyD Mr. YEUNG Chiu-tim, Louis Assistant Housing Manager / Tai Po District Tenancy Management Office / Housing Department (“HD”) Mr. TSUI Yik-fuk Head, Traffic Wing (Tai Po Police District) / Hong Kong Police Force (“HKPF”) Mr. LEUNG Man-tik Assistant Public Relations Manager (External Affairs) / MTR Corporation Limited (“MTR”) Mr. LEE Shut-hang, Imgmar Senior Officer (Planning and Development) / Kowloon Motor Bus Company (1933) Limited (“KMB”) Mr. SHIH Chiu-keung Operations Officer / KMB Mr. POON Chun-kong Assistant Manager (Bus Operations) / Long Win Bus Company Limited (“Long Win”) Mr. LAW Yiu-wah Planning and Support Officer I / Long Win Mr. CHENG Ping-cheung Executive Director / AECOM Limited Mr. LEE Yu-sau, Terence Senior Executive Officer (District Council) / TPDO / HAD Ms. WONG Yu-hang, Anita Senior Liaison Officer (2) / TPDO / HAD - 3 - Absent Mr. CHENG Wai Mr. CHAN Hoi-wing Opening Remarks The Chairman welcomed Mr. CHENG Chun-ping to attend the meeting of the Traffic and Transport Committee (“TTC”) and announced the following: (i) Mr. LO Ka-kan, Gregory of the TD had been transferred and was succeeded by Mr. CHAN Yau-yau, Leo who would attend the meetings from now on. (ii) Ms. MAK Pui-yan of the CEDD was unable to attend this meeting due to other commitments and Mr. NGAN Wing-hong, Victor attended this meeting on her behalf. I. Confirmation of the minutes of the 4th meeting of the TTC in 2017 on 14 July 2017 (TPDC Paper No. TT 47/2017) 2. The Chairman said that as the Secretariat did not receive any proposed amendments and there were no amendments submitted by Members at the meeting, the above minutes had been confirmed and no amendments were necessary. II. Demand for the MTR to enhance its service level (TPDC Paper No. TT 48/2017) 3. The Chairman welcomed Mr. LEUNG Man-tik, Assistant Public Relations Manager (External Affairs) of the MTR to the meeting for the discussion of this item. 4. Mr. TAM Wing-fun, Eric introduced the captioned paper. 5. Mr. LEUNG Man-tik responded as follows: (i) He thanked Members for their comments on the service provided by the MTR. He understood that any delay in railway service would cause inconvenience to passengers and he apologised to the affected passengers on behalf of the MTR. - 4 - (ii) Safety is the top priority of the MTR. The MTR always insisted on safe services and carried out inspection, repair and maintenance on a daily basis. (iii) The MTR ran more than 8 200 trains daily. Some train components might be worn out from daily operations and might malfunction. To minimise mechanical failures, the MTR had stringent asset management and maintenance procedures and had allocated more than $8 billion annually for the repair, maintenance and renovation of its railway assets. (iv) The MTR upgraded the signalling systems of the Island Line, Kwun Tong Line, Tsuen Wan Line and Tseung Kwan O Line at a total cost of $3.3 billion in 2015. To tie in with the Shatin to Central Link (“SCL”) Project, the signalling system of the East Rail Line was being upgraded to cope with the operation of the new trains and automatic platform screen doors. In addition, the MTR had installed on the trains and railroad tracks equipment that was compatible with the new signalling system. Installation of the equipment at the Fo Tan, Racecourse, University, Tai Po Market, Tai Wo and Fanling MTR stations had more or less been completed and the installation along the tracks between the Hung Hom and Lo Wu / Lok Ma Chau MTR stations had also begun. On the other hand, the MTR purchased 93 new trains at a cost of $6 billion to replace the existing ones on the Island Line, Kwun Tong Line, Tsuen Wan Line and Tseung Kwan O Line to provide passengers with a more comfortable travelling environment. The MTR believed that the two measures above would help them maintain a high standard of service. (v) The Remuneration Committee of the MTR Board was responsible for determining the “performance-based remuneration” arrangements for its managerial staff. The committee would consider such factors as the MTR’s performance (including operating performance) and employees’ performance, in order to determine the remuneration level of its managerial staff. (vi) The MTR always valued the safety and reliability of its railway services. It took every incident that had led to delays seriously and conducted investigations and reviews to find rooms for improvements and enhancements. Overall, the reliability of services of the MTR was better than that of railway services in major cities in Europe and the United States. However, the MTR would continue its efforts to keep improving its service performance so as to reduce the inconvenience caused to passengers. 6. Mr. MUI Siu-fung quoted a newspaper report and a university study that there were samples of drug-resistant bacteria in the compartments and handrails of MTR trains, and enquired about the supervision and timetable for the cleaning of MTR train compartments. In addition, he said that the air conditioning in the East Rail Line trains was so insufficient that the compartments were extremely stuffy in hot weather. He asked the MTR to respond to and follow up on the matter. - 5 - 7. Mr. KWAN Wing-yip said that the response of the MTR was nothing but cliché and there was no need to compare with the train services of other countries. He asked how the MTR would compensate the passengers apart from being subject to the Government’s penalty mechanism. He stressed that compensating the passengers did not mean that they accepted the delays of MTR trains, but could at least ease their dissatisfactions. He was glad to see that the MTR had devoted resources to renew the systems and train equipment, and to step up its maintenance efforts. However, he opined that the MTR also had to introduce short-term measures to compensate the passengers. 8. Mr. Eric TAM’s comments and questions were as follows: (i) In his view, when MTR train services had been delayed for a long period of time, the MTR should promptly waive the fares of all passengers so that they could exit the gates free of charge. He also suggested that the MTR should allow passengers to travel for free during the corresponding period of time as compensation. (ii) The MTR once said that with the commission of the SCL, the train signalling of the East Rail Line would be improved and the train services more frequent. Even if the number of cars were to be reduced from 12 to 9, the overall passenger carrying capacity would increase.