港铁公司建设香港铁路有两种方式：政府交出新车站周边土地，或直接付款。无论哪种方式，资金随轨道到位。北部都会区则不同。
MTR Corp. has built Hong Kong’s railways one of two ways: The government handed over land around new stations, or paid directly. Either way, the money arrived with the track. The Northern Metropolis is different.
港铁将投入至少389亿港元（50亿美元），通过借款实现，并需等待数年才能知道其所获土地——在一个从未在此规模下测试过的融资模式下——是否价值等同于线路成本。
MTR is putting up at least HK$38.9 billion ($5 billion), borrowing to do it, and will wait years to find out whether the land it receives in return — under a funding model that has never been tested at this scale — is worth what the lines cost.“In the past, some projects we developed the area and then we built the railway,” said Dominic Law, the head of project delivery for phase one of MTR’s Northern Link.
“过去，我们有些项目先开发区域，再建铁路，”港铁北部链接第一阶段项目交付负责人Dominic Law说。“但进入北部都会区，我们将重点放在基础设施建设上。”
“But moving into the Northern Metropolis, we focus on the infrastructure first.”