Getting around Hong Kong: the Mass Transit Railroad – 港铁 香港

Hong Kong enjoys the most efficient, clean and modern public transport lines I’ve ever seen, and the Mass Transit Railroad (MTR) is their flagship by its own merits.

Besides reaching everywhere and being incredibly clean, the thing that surprises foreign visitors (specially if they are coming from China) is the politeness that everyone has in the MTR stations (and well, everywhere in the city).

People don’t rush, push, yell or bite, as it could happen in the public transport of… uh… Zhuhai? (sorry, is the closest city), and even during the rush hours, stations and wagons are really quiet. It is a big change of landscape when landing in a place where people wait its turn, gets in and out neatly, and it’s really clean, not only in Chinese standards, but also for my European standards:

Here’s a map of the MTR system:

The automatization and integration are other perks. Here below, an MTR gate, with a card reader (the yellow block). The transport card does not need to get out of your wallet, just approach it all together, with the card in the handbag or wallet.

The Octopus Card is a smart electronic money, an all-in one, non-touch payment system, which allows to make payments not only for any kind of public transport (MTR, buses, tram, ferries…) in HK, but also at parking meters, convenience stores, supermarkets, fast-food restaurants and a hell of a list of vending machines.

If you are staying in Hong Kong for more than 2 days, I really recommend you to get this card to move around and pay everywhere comfortably. And you get your deposit back when returning it before leaving the city. By the way, you can get (and return) it at any MTR station.

And if you are lucky enough, maybe you will find amazing things…!

You may also like:

• Hailing a cab in China
• Transport in Hong Kong, a general view