The Transport Department's Pui Ching Road test centre sits between Ho Man Tin and Kowloon Tong, and its road test uses some of Kowloon's busiest arterials. The Department doesn't publish routes and the examiner chooses on the day, but SteerClear's practice routes from Pui Ching Road show which roads the test is drawn from — and they are not the quiet ones.
What the Pui Ching Road practice routes have in common
SteerClear has 10 practice routes that start and finish at the centre. A typical one covers about 8.8 km in 31 minutes. About 70% of the distance is at 50 km/h and 30% at 70 km/h — a much higher share of faster driving than most Hong Kong learners expect from a test in Kowloon.
Roads that come up most
- 培正道 Pui Ching Road — on 10 of 10 routes
- 培正道 — on 10 of 10 routes
- 窩打老道 Waterloo Road — on 10 of 10 routes
- 窩打老道 — on 10 of 10 routes
- 亞皆老街 Argyle Street — on 10 of 10 routes
- 亞皆老街 — on 10 of 10 routes
What each road asks of you
Pui Ching Road itself is the first and last minutes of the test — narrow, with schools, minibuses and parked vehicles; the examiner sees your observation and patience here before anything else. Waterloo Road is the spine of the route: multi-lane, fast in its 70 km/h sections, with filter lanes and flyover approaches where lane choice has to be made early. Argyle Street brings Mong Kok traffic — buses, taxis stopping without warning, pedestrians everywhere — and the tight right turns that produce serious faults when the gap is misjudged.
The 70 km/h sections
Many candidates practise almost entirely in 50 zones and meet the faster sections of Waterloo Road for the first time on test day. Two things matter there: reaching the limit promptly when the road is clear (crawling at 50 in a 70 is marked as failing to make progress), and keeping a proper following distance — at 70 km/h that is a full two seconds in the dry.
How the test runs at Pui Ching Road
Bring your learner's licence and identity card; the car must be roadworthy and display L plates, and if it is a driving-school car the instructor will normally hand over at the centre. The examiner directs you through the road section, which lasts roughly half an hour and must include faster roads as well as the streets around the centre, and scores the drive on a marking sheet with serious faults that fail the test outright. The centre's surroundings are busy at every hour, so expect heavy traffic whatever slot you are given.
The faults that cost most here
On Waterloo Road it is lane discipline on the multi-lane sections and failing to make progress in the 70 km/h stretches. On Argyle Street it is the right turn across traffic made into a gap that closes, and stopping too close behind a bus or minibus that then pulls out. On Pui Ching Road itself it is observation around schools and parked vehicles. Speed over the limit is a serious fault everywhere; speed well under it on Waterloo Road is a fault too.
A practice plan for the final two weeks
- Drive Pui Ching Road in both directions at your test time, watching for school traffic.
- Do a Waterloo Road session end to end, including the 70 km/h stretches and the lane changes before each flyover.
- Drive Argyle Street for the bus, taxi and pedestrian traffic.
- Rehearse the pull-up and move-off on a real Kowloon kerb.
- Finish with a scored mock test.
Practise the Pui Ching Road routes
Our Pui Ching Road centre page lists the roads that come up most and the speed-limit mix, and SteerClear scores every practice drive live. See also how driving test routes work in Hong Kong and what the road test involves.