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6.2 Unleashing Potential from Existing

Land Resources

Admittedly, upon the two rounds of territory-wide land use review
conducted by the government, a remarkable number of sites originally
zoned as “Government, Institution or Community” (GIC) have been
submitted for rezoning. We would like to point out certain land resources
in the urban area that command the potential for more optimised
development.

Our brief research on GIC sites in the Kowloon urban areas shows
there are certain GIC sites in these regions that are either underused or
poorly managed with undesirable conditions. Such sites include cooked
food hawker bazaars, refuse collection points, car parks and work sites and
could be found in areas like Tsuen Wan, Cheung Sha Wan and Yau Ma Tei
(See Figure 38 for an example).

Figure 38: The junction of Temple Street and Pak Hoi Street, Yau Ma Tei

Source: Our Hong Kong Foundation.

To fully realise their development potential, especially when they
are located in the urban areas, one possible way is to redevelop these sites
into composite buildings to accommodate the original use (e.g. the cooked
food facilities) with other public uses atop (e.g. non-permanent residence
like youth hostels). Langham Place is one such preceding case, in which
the indoor cooked food centre is situated at the podium level in a tall
development.

Undoubtedly, much more procedures are needed before such
redevelopment could be carried out. For example, Section 12 rezoning
applications may be required to relax the building height to accommodate
a taller building structure; Section 16 applications may be necessary to
change the land use of the relevant sites; and the relevant terms in the
land lease may need revisions as well.

In terms of actual construction, a detailed transportation impact
assessment may be called for. Special considerations may also be needed

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