Ngau Tau Kok
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Ngau Tau Kok (traditional Chinese: 牛頭角) is an area of Kowloon, Hong Kong, located at the northern part of Kwun Tong District, next to Kowloon Bay. It covers Jordon Valley, Ngau Tau Kok and Upper Kwun Tong Town Central. The population of Ngau Tau Kok exceeds 210,000. It is one of the major residential areas in Kwun Tong District.
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[edit] Geography
In Chinese, Ngau Tau Kok means ox horn. Before the reclamation of Kowloon Bay, the coastal line of Ngau Tau Kok was shaped like a cow horn, therefore there was namely Ox Horn (in Cantonese: Ngau Tau Kok). Ngau Tau Kok includes two hills - Jordon Valley (Shum Wan Shan) and Crocodile Hill (Lok Yue Shan), where around half of the residential blocks are located.
[edit] Features
Ngau Tau Kok is a residential area as well as the by-town central of Kwun Tong District because it is just next to the Kwun Tong town central, and the development of Ngau Tau Kok is highly centralized. The areas around Lower Ngau Tau Kok Estate is known for its street food, including congee, noodles and many other traditional Cantonese cuisine. In summer, Ngau Tau Kok has many religious ceremonies to cerebrate the Yu-lan festival, a festival from Chinese ghost tales.
[edit] History
Ngau Tau Kok has a long history of Hakka habitants. In early colonial days of Hong Kong, it is one of the four hills of Kowloon (九龍四山) in eastern Kowloon where granite was extracted. The granite from Ngau Tau Kok were transported to Victoria City on the Hong Kong Island across Victoria Harbour. Some stone was even exported to Canton City.
Before being a residential area, Ngau Tau Kok was an industrial area. Amoy Food manufacturing was sited in Ngau Tau Kok for manufacturing soy sauce. A high-density private housing estate, Amoy Gardens was constructed on the factory site.
A reservoir, located in Jordon Valley, provided fresh water to residents in Ngau Tau Kok. The reservoir has since then been disused and is now used as a landfill area. A battery was also found in Jordon Valley but it was removed due to the urban development project.
Before the MTR Kowloon Bay Depot was built, the site was formerly the Ngau Tau Kok Industrial Estate.
[edit] SARS Outbreaks
During the spring of 2003, Ngau Tau Kok was severely impacted by the SARS outbreaks. Amoy Gardens (淘大花園) was hit by a serious outbreaks of SARS. Most of the SARS sufferers were living in Block E of Amoy Garden.
[edit] Town Gas Explosion
On 11 April 2006, a fatal underground explosion occurred in Ngau Tau Kok Road and Jordon Valley North Road, two people died and eight were injured. Wai King Building (偉景樓) in Ngau Tau Kok was damaged seriously by an explosion due to the leakage of the town gas from the underground pipes belonging to The Hong Kong and China Gas Company Limited, a major utility in Hong Kong,.
[edit] Transport
Major roads in Ngau Tau Kok includes:
- Choi Ha Road
- Chun Wah Road
- Elegance Road
- Kung Lok Road
- Nagu Tau Kok Road
- Shun Lee Tsuen Road
An MTR station in the northern part of Ngau Tau Kok is named Kowloon Bay, the Ngau Tau Kok MTR station is located in the southern part of Ngau Tau Kok. Both MTR stations are on the Kwun Tong Line.
