The Peak Tram

The Peak Tram is a funicular railway in Hong Kong, which carries both tourists and residents to the upper levels of Hong Kong Island. Running from Garden Road Admiralty to Victoria Peak via the Mid-Levels, it provides the most direct route and offers good views over the harbour and skyscrapers of Hong Kong. Operated since 1888, it was the first funicular railway in Asia. The Peak Tram is owned and operated by Hongkong and Shanghai Hotels (HSH), the owner of Hong Kong's Peninsula Hotel along with other properties. The line, along with HSH's Peak Tower leisure complex at the line's summit, is promoted using the brand The Peak. The Peak is currently being upgraded to have longer cars and wider platforms. Since 22 July 2019, the funicular railway has been reopened for service, using a temporary platform for Garden Road. In the absence of tram service, the New World First Bus non-stop route X15 may be operated between Admiralty and the Peak in addition to the regular bus and minibus services, and other temporary traffic measures may be taken. In 1881, Alexander Findlay Smith first put the project of a Peak Railway into shape and presented a petition for a concession to the governor of Hong Kong. The necessary legislation was passed two years later. Findlay Smith did not approach the project rashly. Travelling extensively in Europe and America, he made himself conversant with nearly every existing method of railway employed for mountain ascent — San Francisco, Scarborough, Rigi, Monterey, Lucerne, the Rhine, Mount Vesuvius — and returned to Hong Kong thoroughly convinced of the feasibility of his idea. The actual construction was begun in September 1885 and in May 1888 the line was officially opened. Smith's business partner, N. J. Ede, owned and lived in the house next to the Upper Terminus, originally named Dunheved, which they converted into the original Peak Hotel. It took three years to build the Peak Tram. Most of the heavy equipment and rails needed for the construction were hauled uphill by the workers with no mechanical support. As a revolutionary new form of transport for Asia at the time, the tramway was considered a marvel of engineering upon its completion. A wooden structure was built for the terminal. According to photographs, the Garden Road terminus was originally an unadorned building, a large clock face was added to the edifice probably between the 1910s and 1920s. The Peak Tram was opened for public service on 28 May 1888 by the then governor Sir George William des Voeux. As built, the line used a static steam engine to power the haulage cable. It was at first used only for residents of Victoria Peak. Despite that, it carried 800 passengers on its first day of operation, and about 150,000 in its first year, transported in the line's original wooden-bodied cars. The tram's existence accelerated the residential development of Victoria Peak and the Mid-Levels.