ENG-1991 — Page 277

TRANSPORT

Parking

The government owns 14 multi-storey carparks which provide 8 200 parking spaces. They are operated and managed by a private company under a management contract. Off-street public parking is also provided by the Civil Aviation Department at Hong Kong International Airport and by the Kowloon-Canton Railway Corporation at some railway stations. The private sector also operates multi-storey and open-air public carparks in commercial buildings, housing estates and open-air lots providing over 50 000 parking spaces. On-street parking is usually metered and provided only at locations where traffic conditions permit. By the end of the year, there were 13 500 metered spaces throughout the territory, most of which operate between 8 am and midnight from Monday to Saturday. In Causeway Bay, Happy Valley, Western and Tsim Sha Tsui where parking demand is high, operation has been extended to include Sundays and public holidays to facilitate a better turnover of parking spaces.

Licensing

The number of new private cars registered increased from 28 926 in 1990 to 31 131 in 1991, an increase of 7.62 per cent. Despite the use of financial restraint measures, which include increasing the First Registration Tax of new private cars from a range of 80 per cent -- 100 per cent to 90 per cent 120 per cent of the cars' CIF costs on March 6, 1991, the total number of licensed cars in December 1991 was 212 017, a growth of 7.16 per cent over the figure in December 1990.

The total number of registered goods vehicles in December 1991 was 134 029, an increase of 3 984 or 3.06 per cent compared with the total of 130 045 in December 1990. Included in these were 103 167 light goods vehicles which grew by 0.94 per cent compared with 1990. Due to the increasing use of these vehicles as private passenger-carrying vehicles and their comparatively high accident involvement rate, restraint measures on the ownership and use of this class of vehicle were introduced in March 1991. The First Registration Tax and annual licensing fees of van-type light goods vehicles were increased. This has had the effect of reducing the number of light goods vehicles but slightly increasing the number of medium goods vehicles. By the end of December, the number of light goods vehicles stood at 89 629, a decrease of 2.44 per cent over the same period in 1990. Meanwhile, the number of medium goods vehicles increased by 9.74 per cent to 27 332 by end-1991.

At the end of the year, the total number of licensed vehicles in all classes was 379 697, an increase of 4.45 per cent over 1990.

The number of new learner-drivers increased from 5 283 per month in 1990 to 5 946 per month in 1991.

Since the introduction of the Driving Offence Points System in 1984, 12 151 drivers have been disqualified. A total of 162 866 warning notices have been served and 324 574 drivers have incurred penalty points for committing offences scheduled under the Road Traffic (Driving-offence Points) Ordinance. The figures for 1991 were 3 137, 66 049 and 15 644 respectively.

Vehicle Examination

In May 1991, the new Kowloon Bay Vehicle Examination Centre was commissioned. This modern, computerised centre has eight dual purpose lanes and two light vehicle lanes and is designed to provide a capacity of about 133 000 annual inspections a year. To help

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