Shatin Hong Kong, also known as Sha Tin, is a large sleeper city about thirty minutes north of Central, Hong Kong. Located in the New Territories, Shatin is the largest of Hong Kong’s 1970s New Town projects and has more than 650,000 residents. It is largely a group of high-rise residential buildings located along the Tuen Mun River, although it is also home to Hong Kong’s largest racecourse and the excellent Hong Kong Heritage Museum.
If you’re only in Hong Kong for a couple of days, it’s hard to recommend Shatin. The best of everything – museums, shops, sights, hotels – are to be found in Hong Kong proper, and it’s not a particularly good base for exploring Hong Kong’s green hinterland either. But, if you have a few more days to spare and / or are especially interested in seeing how Hong Kongers live every day, Sha Tin is a fascinating half-day excursion.
Shatin’s story
Until the 1970s, Shatin was a small rural community surrounded by farmland and a handful of ancestral buildings and food market. All of that changed when the site of Hong Kong’s first new city was designated, designed to try to absorb Hong Kong’s growing population and house the growing number of refugees from China. Created to be largely public housing, a legacy that lives on today, Shatin is essentially a large-scale bedroom community set in carefully organized sections of public housing.
Most of the 650,000 people who live here travel to the city of Hong Kong to work.
The city is divided into several separate districts, with the center based on the New Town Plaza shopping center and the attached MTR subway station.
Things to do in Shatin
The best authentic tourist attraction in the area is the excellent Hong Kong Heritage Museum. Possibly one of the best museums in Hong Kong, the museum documents the rise of the city and the rise of dinosaurs ravaging British red coats. Interactive exhibits create a much more engaging experience that will bring Hong Kong history to life.
Although not quite as spectacular as the city’s main Happy Valley racetrack, Sha Tin Racecourse is still an incredible build and is well worth a visit when the horses are in town (most weekends). With a capacity of 85,000 people and the world’s largest outdoor TV screen, the noise and excitement on race days are exhilarating.
If you’re in town to see what life is like for an average Hong Konger, take a stroll through the New Town Plaza shopping center above the MTR station. The plaza is packed with shoppers after office hours and on weekends, as locals indulge in their favorite pastime of filling their shopping bags. Unlike the upscale shopping malls of Central and Causeway Bay, the Plaza is filled with good-value shops and restaurants geared toward the average man.
How to get there
The best way to get to Shatin is via the MTRsEast (blue) railway line from Tsim Sha Tsui East. The journey takes 19 minutes and costs HK $ 8 for a single ticket. Trains run from just after 6am to just before midnight. If you are traveling to the racecourse, you will have to travel to Fo Tan, or the dedicated Sha Tin racecourse stop, which operates on race days.
