IMPLICATIONS
CONFIDENTIAL
(a) Impact on Kai Tak
3.
Earlier this
year an in-house study was undertaken to
examine the extent to which traffic might be diverted to
Shenzhen Airport from Kai Tak and thereby bring some relief to
the congestion of the latter. The study concluded that the most
likely scenario was a diversion to Shenzhen of at most all non-scheduled Hong Kong/China air services totalling 5.7% of Kai
Tak's passenger throughput (about one million passengers). The
diversion of other international air services were disregarded
since given that Shenzhen is a PRC airport, we would not be in a
position to direct traffic governed by our bilateral air
services agreements to that airport, nor would we wish to do so
as it would cause unacceptable damage to Hong Kong's ability to
remain a centre for "international aviation" and to the future
prospects of all Hong Kong airlines.
4.
Similarly, it was considered unlikely that there would
be а diversion of all existing Hong Kong/China traffic to
Shenzhen because any diversions would result in PRC carriers
losing significant amounts of foreign exchange and there would
be strong resistance from those points in China currently
benefitting economically from direct air links to Hong Kong.
Dragonair would also lose all access to the Chinese market. The
study therefore concluded that at most
any diversion would
comprise non-scheduled services.
5.
The above
the Memorandum of
construction of the
Airport has started
study was conducted prior to the signing of
Understanding and the completion of the
Shenzhen Airport. Since then, Shenzhen
commercial operations. The Chinese side
CONFIDENTIAL