Here's the HK Desk briefing for July 14.

Star Ferry filed for a fare hike this week. Thirty percent, they're asking the Transport Department. Right now a pier-to-pier crossing is $5 on a weekday, $3.40 on weekends. Do the math on thirty percent and you're looking at something like $6.50, $4.40. For a boat ride that takes about eight minutes and has been crossing the harbour since 1888.

Star Ferry says it's running at a loss, and I believe them, the tourists all take the MTR now and the ferry is basically subsidised nostalgia at this point. But here's the part that gets me: this is the company that just spent money doing up the piers, adding the retail, leaning hard into the "heritage experience" pitch to tourists. You can't charge heritage prices and then tell the uncle who takes it to work every morning that his commute is going up thirty percent because the business model doesn't work. Pick one. Either it's a transport service for Hong Kong people, priced like one, or it's a harbour cruise for visitors and the fare reflects that. Right now Star Ferry wants to be both, and the person eating the gap is whoever's actually on the boat at 8am on a Tuesday.