The proposal to charge an entry fee for the High Island Reservoir East Dam is a pathetic, band-aid solution to a hemorrhage. Lawmakers are currently wringing their hands over "Golden Week" crowds, suggesting a HK$100 or HK$200 toll to thin the herd. They think they are solving a logistics problem. They are actually admitting they have no idea how to manage a world-class geological asset.
Charging for entry is the lazy way out for a government that has forgotten how to curate an experience. If you put a price tag on the East Dam, you aren't protecting the environment; you are simply turning a UNESCO Global Geopark into a private club for the middle class. It won’t stop the Uber drivers from clogging the narrow access roads, and it won’t stop the influencers from trampling the flora for a selfie. It just makes the congestion more exclusive.
The real problem isn't that too many people want to see the hexagonal volcanic rock columns. The problem is that the city has funneled them all into one tiny, unequipped cul-de-sac because it lacks the imagination to develop the rest of the Sai Kung hinterland.
The Myth of Over-Tourism
We hear the word "over-tourism" every time a holiday weekend rolls around. It’s a convenient lie. Hong Kong isn’t suffering from too many tourists; it’s suffering from a total failure of spatial distribution.
The East Dam is currently a bottleneck by design. You have one road in, one road out, and a taxi monopoly that treats the route like a private gold mine. When a lawmaker suggests an entry fee, they are essentially trying to use "surge pricing" on nature. It’s a capitalist solution to a conservation crisis, and it never works.
Look at Venice. Look at Bhutan. Entry fees and "tourist taxes" do not reduce the impact on the land; they just change the tax bracket of the person doing the impacting. A wealthy tourist drops just as much plastic and puts just as much strain on the trail as a budget traveler. Probably more, considering the luxury transport they demand to get there.
The Hexagonal Column Trap
The East Dam is famous for its $140$-million-year-old rock formations. These are genuinely world-class features. However, the way they are presented to the public is insulting. We have turned a geological marvel into a background for social media.
The "lazy consensus" among city planners is that if you build a wooden boardwalk and put up a sign with a QR code, you’ve done your job. You haven't. You've created a stage set.
By centering the entire Geopark experience on the East Dam, the government has created a "sacrifice zone." They are essentially saying, "Go here, take your photo, and leave the rest of the park alone." This concentration of human activity is what causes the erosion and the trash piles.
If we actually cared about the Geopark, we would be talking about decentralization.
- Water-Based Access: Why are we forcing thousands of people into green minibuses and red taxis? The East Dam is on the coast. A high-frequency, regulated ferry or water taxi service from Sai Kung Town or Ma Liu Shui would eliminate the road traffic overnight.
- Alternative Hubs: There are hundreds of other hexagonal column sites in the Ung Kong Group and the Ninepin Group. They remain inaccessible to anyone without a private boat. By failing to provide public transport to these other sites, the government is forcing the "Golden Week" masses into a single, fragile point of failure.
The Taxi Cartel and the Logistics Nightmare
Let’s talk about the "battle of the dam." During any public holiday, the queue for taxis at the East Dam is a scene of pure chaos. Drivers regularly "negotiate" illegal flat rates, charging HK$300 or more for a trip that should cost a fraction of that.
A HK$100 entry fee won't fix this. It will just be another cost for the consumer to swallow while the logistics remain broken.
The solution isn't to tax the hiker; it’s to break the taxi monopoly. The Transport Department’s refusal to allow high-capacity, low-emission shuttle buses to run every 10 minutes from Pak Tam Chung is the single biggest contributor to the East Dam’s decline. They claim the roads are too narrow for buses. This is nonsense. If a construction truck can get up there to maintain the reservoir, a modern electric shuttle can too.
The city is choosing to protect the earnings of a few taxi licenses over the ecological integrity of a UNESCO site. That is the "insider" truth no lawmaker will tell you on the evening news.
Nature is Not a Commodity
When you start charging for access to the countryside, you change the psychology of the visitor.
In a free public park, there is a (fading) sense of collective stewardship. Once you pay an entry fee, the visitor becomes a "customer." And the customer is always right. The moment someone pays HK$200 to stand on that dam, they feel entitled to behave however they want. "I paid for this," is the mantra of the person who leaves their water bottle on the rocks or climbs over the safety railing for a better angle.
We don't need a fee. We need friction.
The best way to protect nature is to make it slightly difficult to reach. Not through a paywall, but through effort. The current problem is that the East Dam is too easy to reach poorly. You can take a taxi to the very edge of the abyss. This invites the type of "hit-and-run" tourism that provides zero economic value to the local Sai Kung community and maximum damage to the environment.
The Actionable Pivot
If we want to save the East Dam, we need to stop thinking like accountants and start thinking like rangers.
- Ban Private Vehicles and Taxis Completely: Make the road from Pak Tam Chung a dedicated corridor for zero-emission public shuttles only. No exceptions.
- Permit-Based Hiking: Instead of a fee, require a free, digital "entry permit" with a hard daily cap. This controls the crowd size without discriminating based on wealth.
- Invest in the Sea: Build the infrastructure to make the Geopark a marine-first experience. If people arrived by boat, they would see the columns as they were meant to be seen—from the water, in their full, towering context—rather than looking down at them from a concrete dam.
I’ve seen this play out in national parks across the globe. The moment you introduce a fee without fixing the transport infrastructure, you just get an expensive version of the same mess.
The East Dam is a victim of its own beauty and the city's total lack of logistical courage. A HK$100 entry fee is a white flag. It’s an admission that the government has given up on managing the land and just wants to profit from its degradation.
Nature doesn't need a cash register. It needs a gatekeeper who actually understands the terrain. Stop trying to monetize the view and start managing the movement. Or better yet, leave the dam to those willing to walk the MacLehose Trail to get there. The "Instagram crowds" won't survive a 10km hike, and that is exactly the point.
