Public transportation in Hong Kong- statistics & facts

For decades, driving has been the major way of reaching places in the vast majority parts of the world, leading to a constantly increasing number of cars in the whole world, and Hong Kong is no exception. The private car parc in Hong Kong had been increasing, from around 472,000 in 2011 to 657,000 in 2021. Even as a small city of around one thousand square kilometers of area, both the status symbol and convenience added to the popularity of car ownership, even though the public transportation network in Hong Kong is famous for being one of the most efficient system. Hong Kong saw an average of 10.6 million daily trips on public transport in 2021, an 18 percent recovery from the previous year when the COVID-19 pandemic broke out.

What are the major types?

Major kinds of public transport in Hong Kong include franchised buses, subway and public light buses, altogether accounting for over 88 percent of all passenger journeys by public transport in Hong Kong. Rail includes the major MTR lines operating mainly in the central area, which was connected to other railways such as west rail and east rail serving other districts in the New Territories. All railways accounted for the highest number of average daily passenger journeys on public transport, while franchised buses own the largest size of fleet among all modes of public transport. Kowloon Motor Bus Co. (1933) Ltd. (KMB) serves most parts of the city and is the largest franchised bus operator in Hong Kong, with a passenger carrying capacity around 5.5 times that of the second-place holder, Citybus franchise 1. In addition, Hong Kong has two types of public light buses: the red minibus (RMB) and the green minibus (GMB). GMB operates more areas than RMB and therefore has a much bigger fleet and passenger-carrying capacity.

Customer complaints

However, the public transport system in Hong Kong is not perfect. Since 2009, the number of complaints and suggestions received by the Transport Complaints Unit (TCU) has doubled in the last decade. As the most common franchised bus operator in Hong Kong, KMB received over 2,200 complaints and suggestions regarding service regularity in the second quarter of 2022 alone. At the same time, KMB was the most investigated type of public transport due to complaints filed, followed closely by taxi services. Most of the complaints filed against taxis concerned drivers' conduct and performance.
This text provides general information. Statista assumes no liability for the information given being complete or correct. Due to varying update cycles, statistics can display more up-to-date data than referenced in the text.
Published by Statista Research Department, Dec 1, 2023

Key insights

Number of private cars registered in Hong Kong
657k
Number of motor cycles registrations in Hong Kong
100k
Share of passenger journeys in Hong Kong taken on railways
41.9%
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