Current condition
Demolished / No longer exists
Date completed
(Day, Month, & Year are approximate.)
Date closed / demolished
(Day, Month, & Year are approximate.)
Dates are guesses.
The line of temporary buildings can be seen in this photo, which shows the empty space where the Central Market will be built:
Does anyone know what they were used for? Some guesses:
- Temporary market stalls while the market was being built?
- Accommodation / offices for the market construction?
- Accommodation / offices for the Praya Reclamation?
Photos that show this Place
c.1891
c.1892
1894
Comments
The following notification…
The following notification appeared in the 1895 Government Gazette. I'm not sure if it refers to the temporary buildings we're talking about on this page, or some other buildings. The dates match, but the junction of the Praya and Wing Lok Street is further west than I'd have expected, unless the temporary buildings ran all the way along the shoreline from the new Central Market site to that junction.
GOVERNMENT NOTIFICATION.—No. 259.
Offers will be received at this Office until Noon of Monday, the 17th instant, for the purchase and removal of the old Market Shops and Stalls at the junction of the Praya and Wing Lok Street.
No work will be permitted on Sundays.
For form of offer, specification and further particulars apply at the Public Works Office.
The Government does not bind itself to accept the highest or any offer.
By Command,
J. H. Stewart Lockhart,
Colonial Secretary.
Colonial Secretary’s Office, Hongkong, 8th June, 1895.
OPENING OF THE NEW CENTRAL MARKET, HONGKONG
From the Hong Kong Weekly Press 1895-05-09 :
The new Central Market was opened on the 1st May. During the day a large staff of bare-backed coolies were busily engaged in removing the fittings from the old dirt begrimed sheds which have for the last few years answered for the Hongkong Market. Judging by the unusual activity with which they went about their work, it was evident that the healthful change was heartily welcomed. [….]