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Wednesday, March 1, 1972
Continuing, the Financial Secretary said: "So there is no doubt
that the underground railway is a complex and difficult project and the
Government certainly cannot at this stage say whether it will or will not
be built.
"What can be said, however, is that other aspects of Hong Kong's
growing traffic and transport problem will need to be tackled resolutely
in the coming years and I must give due warning that unpopular measures
will before long be necessary and will have to be adopted for the good
of the community as a whole."
Restraints Policy On Private Motorista
+
Earlier, the Financial Secretary had said that Government could not
be content with a restraints policy on private motorists alone to cope with
the movement problems of the 1970s and 1980s.
"We are pushing ahead with a road reconstruction and development
programme; and we are considering very carefully the proposal for an underground
railway."
Since the summer of 1971, a small working group of Government officers,
most closely concerned, had been meeting regularly to examine every aspect of
this proposal and to consider it in the context of an overall traffic and
transport policy for llong Kong.
"The group has just completed the first draft of a memorandum for
Executive Council and this is now being considered in the Colonial Secretariat."
Because of this, Mr. Haddon-Cave explained, he could not say a great
deal more about transport policy at the present time.
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