Greener, Sustainable Hong Kong Seen As Plan To Create Artificial Island Gains More Steam

Imagine Hong Kong with sufficient living spaces for everyone, which precisely is the vision being peddled in a new proposal that calls for redrawing partially the map of the crowded city. Relocating identified facilities and constructing a nearby island will ease the burden of the city’s increasingly worrisome housing problem, a new report said.

At the same time, a Hong Kong that is “greener and more sustainable” will likely emerge once the ambitious plan is in fact implemented, the South China Morning Post reported.

The goal of the plan, as proposed in a new study conducted by the think tank Professional Commons, is to free up space in key central sectors of the city and in the process build two new residential centres that will house up to 830,000 Hong Kong residents.

It will be “a fresh start” for the city that essentially will see the benefits of living space decongestion and reduced air pollution, the group said.

Core Solution Is Reclamation

The general blueprint being pushed by Professional Commons is for the reclamation of an estimated 520 hectares of new land west of Lantau Island and right within the mainland Chinese waters. When completed, the artificial island will host the Kwai Tsing container terminal, the largest in the city, and the Fanling Golf Course.

The transfer of the facilities will then allow Hong Kong’s housing authorities to build new homes and flats at the old sites that will accommodate nearly one million of the high density city.

The new island, according to the group, will be designed as a modern harbour with direct links to the main city territory and Macau. Of note too is that the relocated golf course will boast of a commanding view of the sea, per the presented project plan.

To realise the development, which the SCMP said will specifically feature “natural landscape with beaches and mountain streams … while also providing some 42 million square feet of office floor space,” Hong Kong authorities will need to expand the city’s territorial waters or secure a deal with Zhuhai City for the lease of the new territories.

However, how exactly the scheme will play out, considering the need to closely coordinate with authorities outside of Hong Kong, was not discussed the in the same report.

Similar Proposal

Recently, a group led by former HK Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa submitted a similar project that will reclaim land east of Lantau Island, according to Property Report.

That proposal though to build an artificial island will see the construction of 250,000 new flats to take in over one million Hong Kong residents.