Kowloon: Tsim Sha Tsui - Hong Kong: Top Sights, Local Life, Made Easy - page 181

Built on the site of a barracks for Muslim Indian soldiers in the colonial army, Kowloon
Park is an oasis of greenery and a refreshing escape from the hustle and bustle of Tsim
Sha Tsui. Pathways and walls criss-cross the grass, birds hop around in cages, and ancient
Chinese banyans dot the landscape. ( www.lcsd.gov.hk / parks/kp/en/index.php; 22 Austin Rd;

6am-mid-

night; Tsim Sha Tsui, exit A1, Jordan, exit C1)

Understand
TST, Breeze for the Feet

The crowds and the traffic might obscure it, but Tsim Sha Tsui is one of the most walkable urban areas in Hong
Kong. Architect Freddie Hai once put a ruler on the area's footpaths and found most to be 250m to 300m in
length. Metro stations have a catchment radius of 500m, the rough equivalent of an eight-minute stroll. At half
the length, streets in TST take only four minutes to walk.

What's more, linking most of TST's meandering avenues are T-junctions (where one road joins another at
right angles but does not cross it). The very layout of the T-junction creates a sense of neighbourly enclosure
while dangling the promise of fresh horizons at every corner. So reaching Canton Rd from Peking Rd, would it
be right to the Macau Ferry Terminal or left to the Space Museum? Compare this to the sprawling, criss-crossing
grid that is Yau Ma Tei - a fascinating area buzzing with life, that could also alienate or disorient if you're new
to it.
Good old Nathan Rd is never more than four blocks away, no matter where you're at in TST. Beginning just
shy of the harbour, Kowloon's earliest strip of asphalt runs past Yau Ma Tei to end in Mong Kok, offering the re-
assurance of a linear narrative in a labyrinthine plot, and a choice of many, many endings.