XRL – Visit the Village Doomed by The High Speed Rail Link

Hong Kong – Tsoi Yuen Tsuen will be bulldozed out of existence later this year to make way for Hong Kong’s controversial HK$66.9 billion (US$8.6 billion) high-speed Express Rail Link (XRL).

Soundslide By Lily Lee, Monami Yui and Cleo Chen

The 26-kilometre rail spur will pass near by, requiring the approximately 500 inhabitants of the tsuen (village) to make way for an emergency station.

The government offered a compensation package to villagers — up to HK$600,000 in cash and the chance to get subsidised housing without being means-tested — but not all were happy.

While all registered for the government’s compensation package ahead of the March 1 deadline — including 90 households that had been adamantly opposed to moving — a number said they would refuse the offer of public housing and would move only if the government resettled them on farming land.