Percival Street - Now and Then

One more from the Times Square vicinity as I compare Percival Street from 1956 to 2026 - a nice round 70 year difference. The older images are from Flight to Hong Kong and the camera is located on Percival Street looking up Matheson Street (in the initial image) and then moving slightly left to look up Percival Street (lower images).

In the older, top image you can see the relatively empty space to the right of the tram which is where the old tram depot was located. Today's view shows how the Times Square development now occupies it. Although the roads and surrounding buildings occupy the same spaces they did 70 years ago.

Moving the camera slightly to the left and we are now looking south along Percival Street. The buildings that occupy the block between Percival and Matheson Streets are not the same ones from 70 years ago but, as is often the case with buildings in Hong Kong, the footprint remains the same even if the modern buildings are much taller. Actually, the building that currently occupies that angled corner plot in the foreground is called Percival House and it was constructed in 1959, so the earlier building seen in the older image didn't have long to go before it was replaced.

There are two buildings that can be "just about" seen in both images, however, the angle is a bit too acute to make out any great detail. In the upper image, if you go from the left and follow the Lee Theatre building until the vertical signage, the next two blocks belong to buildings that are currently still intact: 87- 89 Percival Street. In my modern comparison snap below they are the two blocks with the red vertical sign in front of them. They were built in 1954 and so weren't that old when Flight to Hong Kong was filmed.