I'm not sure of the date it changed from reservoir to park. In the book Mapping Hong Kong, the 1964 map (plate 3-6) shows it as "Braemar Reservoir", but the 1990 map (plate 3-7) shows it as "Choi Sai Woo Park", so sometime between those two dates. <Read more ...>
It has also to be mentioned that the Colony’s air defences were practically nil. In the now-remote pre-war years effective air defence appeared to be impracticable, because the limited land area of Hong Kong affords little space for airfields. The lessons of the war, however, may suggest methods of overcoming that difficulty. Neighbouring small islands could be flattened and converted into “airstrips.” <Read more ...>
In early Hong Kong, you got your water from wells or streams. The first attempt to provide a more reliable source was the Pokfulam Reservoir, and its associated conduit. The conduit carried water round the island from the reservoir, following the hillside above Pokfulam Road, and ending near the junction of Albany Road and Robinson Road.
There are still plenty of signs of this old water system. Pokfulam reservoir is the most obvious, clear to anyone looking south from the Peak:
And the path of the old conduit above mid-levels is immortalised by the name of the road that was built on top of it:
Thomas, one of the regular contributors to Gwulo, has been using the 'Places' feature to document other parts of the conduit's route that are still visible. Here they are on a map and list. (If you know of any more, just create a Place and give it the tag Pokfulam Conduit, and it will automatically appear on the map and list below.)
The map is 'live': you can drag it around with your mouse, click the +/- buttons to zoom in and out, and click the Map/ Satellite/ Hybrid buttons to change the appearance of the map.
This would be difficult to mark as the Pokfulam Conduit runs along approximately the 150 contour line on maps. Some sections of it are visible from Pokfulam Road and some of the side roadsm, for some other section you may walk atop of it. Some had been under developed sites like Queen Mary Hospital.
I had an impression that the conduit, which is still in use today, had been graded. <Read more ...>
Here's the AAB's Historic Building Appraisal. Unfortunately I didn't read it until after the visit, or I'd have looked for the loopholes and air raid shelter. <Read more ...>
Construction work commenced in 1957 and was completed in 1963. The reservoir intercepts and gathers the gully water flowing from the neighbouring mountain ridges on its three sides. With a storage capacity of 24 million cubic metres, it was once the largest reservoir in Hong Kong during the 1960's. <Read more ...>
