1979: Aerial views of TST

Submitted by David on Tue, 01/08/2013 - 17:00

Thanks to regular contributor IDJ for uploading these aerial views of Tsim Sha Tsui (TST), taken in 1979. Anyone living in TST at the time must have felt they were surrounded by construction projects!

Here's the first view:

Tsim Sha Tsui East-May 1979

The bright blue rectangle is HK Polytechnic University's swimming pool. Above it is the entrance to the Cross Harbour Tunnel. The amazing thing about the 1979 view? No queues of traffic waiting to enter the tunnel!

The cameraman flies south, then looks back to the north:

Tsim Sha Tsui East-May 1979

The big construction site in the centre of the photo will be the Coliseum when it is finished.

The cameraman is further out over the harbour for the next one:

Tsim Sha Tsui East-May 1979

The empty area in the foreground is TST East. The roads have been laid out, and work is just beginning on the first buildings.

From here he flies further south, then heads back north up the pensinsula to get this view:

Tsim Sha Tsui May 1979

The white dome in this photo is the Hong Kong Space Museum's planetarium under construction. Left of the dome we can see the hotel (today it's the Intercontinental Hotel) and parts of the New World Centre being built. We get a better view of them in the next photo, taken from further up Nathan Road:

Tsim Sha Tsui-May 1979

The last photo shows the old Whitfield Barracks being transformed into today's Kowloon Park:

Tsim Sha Tsui-May 1979

Thanks again to IDJ for sharing these photos with us. (If you'd like to post an old photo here, it's not difficult to do. Just follow these instructions.)

Regards, David

PS If you're free tomorrow evening (Wednesday, 9th Jan), I'm meeting a few Gwulo regulars for a chat over a beer then dinner. You're very welcome to join us. Click here for details.

Comments

This was the year I arrived in Hong Kong and spent three months in the old Merlin Hotel in TST. I remember the building of the planetarium and the development of TST East. So it was a bit of a shock on a visit last October (2012) to see the New World Centre being demolished! 

The first 3 aerial pictures are of Hung Hum, it is right on top of Tsim Sha Tsui on the north east of the peninsula. The large white rectanglar building is a multi-level car park, below it is the new railway terminal, the Kowloon Canton Railway.