Government will plan its finances so as to leave not less
than HK$25 billion in reserves in 1997.
17. At a meeting in Rio on 12 June the Prime Minister and Premier Li Peng agreed that high level talks should be held
to carry forward negotiations on the financing arrangements for the new airport. These were held in early July in
Peking but no progress was made, further discussions are taking place in the Airport Committee established under the Joint Liaison Group.
18. The total cost of the new airport and related
infrastructure projects was estimated at HK$ 112.2 billion
at March 1991 prices. The private sector is expected to take up som 60% of the funding. The new airport itself is
scheduled to come into operation in 1997, intially with one
runway. When fully developed, it will have two runways,
will be able to operate 24 hours a day and to handle 80 million passengers a year. Supporting infrastructure will include a fixed crossing (ie suspensionn bridges) linking
North Lantau to Hong Kong Island via Tsing Yi and
West Kowloon, and road and rail transport links.
19.
Many consultancy contracts have been awarded to British
companies including Kleinwort Benson, Wardley's and Mott
MacDonald and Maunsell. A reclamation project has been
awarded to Gammon (in which Jardines and Trafalgar House
have half shares) and a group lead by British Airports
Authority has won the contract to design the new airport
terminals. The contract for the main bridge (Lantau Fixed
Link) was recently awarded to the Anglo-Japanese Consortium,
which inclues Trafalgar House, Costain and Mitsui, and the
contract for Phase 1 of the North Lantau Express way was won
by a consortium which includes AMEC (UK). These are the two
largest PADS related contracts to have been awarded so far.
20. There are strong British bids for other key works
elements of the project, including the airport platform
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