22 Hours to Walk Around Hong Kong Island’s Coast—and the Man Behind It

Every hiking junkie in Hong Kong is well familiar with the mammoth Stanley-to-Nan Chung Wilson Trail, the brutality of the hilly Dragon’s Back, and the 100-kilometre MacLehose trail stretching the length of Kowloon.

These trails are designed for the young and old who can endure aching thighs and sweat leaching from their skin in the blazing heat. They are not walks in the park.

Enter back into the city on foot and one can experience the vast difference as compared to a country park walk: noisy, polluted with exhaust fumes, bewildering for a pedestrian to follow blocked streets and mandatory changes in elevation.

Hong Kong’s love for hiking triggered Dutch-born former Hong Kong politico Paul Zimmerman to reimagine what a walk around (the whole of) Hong Kong Island may look like.

An avid country park hiker and a passionate Hong Konger since his arrival to the city in 1984, Zimmerman, 62, has constantly focused on walkability and livability in his Hong Kong career as a banker, strategist, business owner, politician, and now urban planner.

Following his stint as a Southern District Councilor, Zimmerman’s latest project aims to raise awareness of the coastal trail in Hong Kong Island, a plan to make the entire perimeter coast of the island accessible for walking.

Zimmerman’s plan for an around-the-island Hong Kong coastal trail materialized in December 2020 with the launch of his website Coastalrail.hk, an online library and anthology of routes around Hong Kong Island, points of pertinent interest for walkers, and areas needing improvement.

The coastal trail is 65-killometeres across the perimeter coast of Hong Kong Island with eight stages covering “easy and moderate” trails, from steep climbs to flat urban harbourside walks.

The whole coastal walk would take you a lengthy 22 hours to traverse and 85,000 steps in a day.

The coastal trail was planned and designed by Designing Hong Kong, Zimmerman’s not-for-profit organization “promoting sustainable urban planning in Hong Kong,”, representing his formal venture into lobbying government groups and residents about how to make Hong Kong accessible not just for vehicles, but every person with two legs.

“The plan for the coastal trail,” Zimmerman explained in the interview with The Beat Asia, “is to expand opportunities for leisure and the ability for Hong Kongers, young and old, to explore the coast of Hong Kong Island.”

With the support from iDiscovery and TrailWatch, and the engagement of hundreds of trail walkers, the team created both an interactive online map and a physical copy to guide those eager to venture out on Hong Kong’s coast.

A walk along the coastal trail covers eight stages in the four districts of Hong Kong Island, joining both user-submitted trails and government-recognized hikes:

• Western Harbour Walk: HK Convention & Exhibition Centre to Kennedy Town
• Mt. Davis Coastal Walk: Kennedy Town to Cyberport
• Aberdeen Harbour Walk: Cyberport to Ocean Park
• Southern Beaches Walk: Ocean Park to Stanley
• Tai Tam Nature Walk: Stanley to To Tei Wan Beach
• Long Dragon’s Back Walk: To Tei Wan Beach to Siu Sai Wan
• Chai Wan City Walk: Siu Sai Wan to Aldrich Bay
• Eastern Harbour Walk: Aldrich Bay to Wan Chai Ferry Pier

Organised by Designing Hong Kong, the NGO worked with iDiscover, a neighbourhood guides app, and TrailWatch, a nature conservation app, to source pertinent local spots for inclusion in the guide.

The ex-Victoria Detention Centre in Mount Davis, Mills & Chung Path on the Southside, Tam Kung Temple in Shau Kei Wan, and the Jardine Noonday Gun in Causeway Bay are some points of interest located on the coastal trail map, but unknown to most trail walkers in Hong Kong.

The coastal trail is a working project and will continue to be until Zimmerman and his team find the support from relevant government departments, such as the Transportation Department and Architectural Services, to fund routes and byways.

As of October 2021, a working list of 20 sites required for maintenance or improvement are recorded on Coastaltrail.hk. Each proposal for relevant street work is queried with residents to ensure support and registered with relevant government departments to notify works that need to be in place.

Widening of promenades, pavement for dangerous roads, and connecting links from waterways are some of the issues that require assistance and funds from the government to make the whole coast walkable. The Sandy Bay to Telegraph Bay link is, as Zimmerman pointed out, emblematic of an issue traversing the coast of Hong Kong Island.

The 250-meter pathway from Sandy Bay at the bottom of Pokfulam to Telegraph Bay south of Cyberport is one of Hong Kong’s “most stunning walks,” yet Zimmerman has been advocating for 10 years on development works connecting the short harbourside walk down Sandy Bay to Telegraph Bay connecting the hub of Cyberport.

Another missing link is a bridge over the large waterfall at Wah Fu. This would allow a continuous walk from Victoria Road in Pokfulam to Deep Water Bay. An engineer quoted HKD$50 million for the works, but government infighting between the Architectural Services Department and Leisure and Cultural Services Department of who will maintain the bridge prevents the works from going ahead. “Weird bureaucracy,” Zimmerman claims.

Talking about what problem Hong Kong’s trails face, he mentioned that while the city’s island-wide country parks are established and supported by various government groups, they however lack necessary connector links to other trails or greenbelt areas. Some trails are well maintained and signposted, others are blocked by slope work and roads bulldozing over hidden paths.

Zimmerman’s ultimate goal for the project is to provide “a continuous coastal trail that every resident of Hong Kong Island can easily reach from wherever they live, and they can go for as long as they want for whenever they have time.”

“If the Hong Kong Island coast is walkable, then people will walk more,” Zimmerman said, paying tribute to the mantra of “if you build it, they will come.”

“If they (Hong Kongers) have time to walk, they can get [to places] further, or people are willing to just walk further. [They might] give up on a taxi ride or a minibus because it's nice and convenient to do so. It's healthier, but also makes the city more fun when people just walk about.”

He wants the government to recognize the Hong Kong Island coastal trail as an official signposted trail, designed and maintained with slope works protecting paths in the event of typhoons or landslides and recognition of monuments deemed important for local history.

“I love this urban planning stuff,” Zimmerman told The Beat Asia.

His passion for the project of mapping Hong Kong’s coast is embodied within his love for Hong Kong.

“Tell me about any other city in the world that has [all these] fantastic attributes that Hong Kong has, whether it's our food and culture, whether it's you know seas and sailing and paragliding, hiking, being in the nature, only 10 minutes away from a high-density city in the number one financial trading centres in the world.”

Zimmerman’s passion for this ongoing project began in the early 2000s. On his days off and trips to work, he frequented the Hong Kong Island harbourfront regularly with his motorbike on joy rides and slow walks with friends. “The waterfront wasn’t getting very good (sic),” reclamation efforts were underway to extend the Island north but walking in the rocky and muddy area “sucked” for those who wanted to enjoy a waterside stroll.

Zimmerman saw an opportunity for exciting urban development on the harbourfront that was growing in size and began work alongside local businessman Chung Po-yan to kickstart a project titled Designing Hong Kong Harbourfront District, a non-government nonprofit devoted to improving livability and walkability alongside Hong Kong’s waterfronts.

This prompted the government in 2004 to set up the Harbourfront Enhancement Committee, a government planning committee to manage a formal response to the project, extending a bureaucratic hand out to make Hong Kong’s waterfronts pedestrian- friendly.

The committee was upgraded to a commission in 2010. In the meantime, Zimmerman’s passion for walking next to water in Hong Kong transitioned to his NGO today, Designing Hong Kong, which was founded alongside Christine Loh, Peter Wong, and Markus Shaw in September 2009. Their offices today are in the hidden Wing Ko Street in Sheung Wan. They are constantly working on projects concerning livability, walkability, recycling, and climate change in Hong Kong.