Then & Now | Gas street lighting in Hong Kong: its history, and where to find the surviving relics of an era that ended over a half-century ago
- Gas street lighting arrived in Hong Kong barely 20 years after its founding as a British colony, and into the 1950s there were still 10 lamplighters working
- The last gas lamps were turned off in 1964, but several examples survive – some disused, others converted to run on electricity, some even gas-fired still
Nineteenth century urban Hong Kong had numerous markers of striking modernity.
From reliable mains electricity and the submarine telegraph cables that connected local and overseas markets in real time, to reticulated potable water supplies and modern police services, the British colony was usually the first port in China to have such innovations.
Hong Kong’s only other close competitor in terms of modernisation was that other foreign-created international city – Shanghai. While most of these inventions have long since been superseded by technological advances, some traces remain.
Gas street lighting is one of the more unexpected legacies of the past still to linger into the present day.
A by-product of the 18th century Industrial Revolution in Britain and elsewhere in Europe, which led to the opening of extensive coal mines, gas street lighting was introduced in the early 19th century, and by the 1830s had become commonplace in cities from London and Paris to Baltimore.
