1 Plan for interim museum in historic building scrapped
Olga Wong and Vivienne Chow, SCMP 28 February 2009
Ronald Arculli and Allan Zeman at a panel meeting. Photo: K. Y Cheung Source: SCMP
Plans to house an interim museum - seen as a test run for the flagship M+ museum in West Kowloon - in a historic building have been abandoned, the government told lawmakers yesterday.
The interim museum, dubbed interim M+, was scheduled to open next year at the former Royal Hong Kong Yacht Club premises in Oil Street, North Point, featuring exhibitions of modern visual arts.
The yacht club is a grade two historic building. The government said early last year that the Architectural Services Department would be responsible for the museum's design and refurbishment.
But the Home Affairs Bureau told lawmakers on a joint subcommittee monitoring the West Kowloon Cultural District project that the plan had changed.
"The Oil Street location is no longer appropriate for the interim M+," Deputy Secretary for Home Affairs Cathy Chu Man-ling said. "The museum committee [of the West Kowloon Cultural District Authority] will plan to hold relevant exhibitions on Hong Kong Island, and in Kowloon and the New Territories from time to time."
Ms Chu said the government was still exploring other sites to accommodate the interim museum, without naming locations or giving a timetable. A paper submitted to the joint committee yesterday said the yacht club was too small and the government would have to deal with a land contamination problem if a new building was built on the site.
Democratic Party lawmakers Lee Wing-tat and Emily Lau Wai-hing said they were not confident that the future flagship museum in the West Kowloon arts hub would be a success.
"The interim museum was meant to give us some temporary experience of running the future M+," Mr Lee said. "The funding for the arts hub was approved last July but the museum is still not happening."
Secretary for Home Affairs Tsang Tak-sing said finding talented people to run the interim museum was more important. "We have to find the right people to run the museum," he said. "Their ideas should be in line with the museum's objectives."
Ada Wong Ying-kay, a member of the cultural district authority's consultation panel, said the interim museum did not need a fixed location.
"Artists had advocated building a museum which can shift from district to district, like the Chanel exhibition held in Tamar," she said. "A museum located in North Point will be meaningless for people living in Tin Shui Wai. It's difficult to reach."
2 Developer wins bid to rezone Tai Po green belt, farmland for spa resort
Joyce Ng, SCMP 28 February 2009
The Town Planning Board yesterday approved a developer's proposal to rezone a Ting Kok site for a spa resort project, sparking concerns among environmentalists about further encroachment on rural Tai Po.
The 3.3-hectare site facing Plover Cove is the first area to be rezoned for a spa resort in the city.
Originally zoned as green belt and farmland, the site lies northeast of a mangrove site of special scientific interest, and northwest of a controversial artificial beach planned at Lung Mei. To its immediate south, another planned hotel resort is to be assessed by the board.
Although the board approved the rezoning, proposed by developer Wheelock Properties, members raised concerns about the cumulative impact of the developments in the area during discussion.
"A spa hotel will discharge huge amounts of sewage compared to other developments, but the sea water quality was said to be poor when the government proposed the man-made beach," board member Ng Cho-nam said. "Can you guarantee the project will not worsen the water quality?"
Another board member, Tony Kan Chung-nin, said a giant Kwun Yum statue would be built at a nearby temple and he questioned whether the roads could cope with the future increase in traffic flow.
The hotel will discharge 377 cubic metres of sewage a day. Kenneth To Lap-kee, a consultant for the developer, said sewer and pumping stations' capacity would be enlarged and nearly half the sewage would be recycled for irrigation. The hotel would not open until this work was completed, he said, adding that road widening would absorb the traffic.
According to Wheelock's submission, the plan is based on a plot ratio of 0.6 and involves four three-storey hotel blocks and 20 villas for 237 guests. They will be built around a swimming pool, with a commercial complex on the corner of the site.
With the rezoning approved, the developer still has to submit another application for building the hotel and acquire the remaining 13 per cent of private land from villagers.
The project has drawn opposition from villagers and green groups.
Hong Kong Wildlife Forum member Yiu Vor said he was worried about the cumulative impact on wildlife.
"This part of Tai Po will inevitably be paved with concrete, reducing the breeding and feeding grounds for all sorts of wildlife," he said. "But I don't see the Planning Department raising the issue of cumulative impact when advising the board in the paper."
The department said in the paper, released earlier this week, that the low-density resort should not worsen traffic and environmental conditions. The Tourism Commission supported the plan and said it would attract overseas tourists.
But the Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department did not support the project, saying the development seems to deviate from the green belt zoning intention, which defines the limits of suburban development, and it "will irreversibly destroy the farmland".
3 Planners lose appeal on 'toothpick tower' limits
Yvonne Tsui and Olga Wong, SCMP 28 February 2009
Town planners are being too picky about Swire's "toothpick tower" plan for Mid-Levels, a court said yesterday.
They had no right to consider the visual impact and effect on traffic of the development, a three-judge panel ruled.
The Court of Appeal judges upheld a lower court ruling that the Town Planning Board had been wrong to insist on a 12-storey height limit on part of the site of the 50-storey block of flats in Seymour Road, which critics have dubbed a "toothpick tower".
A spokeswoman for Swire said it would start work on the tower as soon as possible.
People living near the site of the proposed tower said the court had ridden roughshod over their concerns.
"I am very unhappy about the ruling," said Elina Li, of Goldwin Heights in Seymour Road.
"The traffic is too heavy here and there are too many construction sites in the area. These cause pollution," she said.
Jason Yee, of Robinson Place, Robinson Road, said the ruling constituted a "mammoth relaxation" of planning rules.
"Thousands of people are against such a toothpick structure that will ill serve an area already plagued by traffic congestion, poor ventilation, restricted sunlight and a host of health concerns," he said.
The rights and wishes of the community had not been respected, he said.
Yesterday's judgment by Mr Justice Frank Stock, Mr Justice Michael Hartmann and Madam Justice Carlye Chu Fun-ling stemmed from an appeal launched by the board in December against a 2007 Court of First Instance ruling in favour of Swire.
The board had based its decision on explanatory notes attached to the outline zoning plan containing the 12-storey height limit for land adjacent to Castle Steps - a steep, stepped street.
But in his ruling, in November 2007, Mr Justice Andrew Cheung Kui-nung, of the Court of First Instance, said the explanatory notes were concerned only with the site's accessibility and there was little to indicate that traffic issues were behind the board's decision to limit development on the site.
He ruled that the development's effect on traffic and its visual impact were irrelevant to the board's consideration of Swire's application and ordered it to relax the 12-storey height limit.
Swire had sought to build a 54-storey tower, but has only received approval for one 50 storeys tall.
A Swire spokeswoman said it would develop the site according to the planning and building approvals it had received.
A board spokeswoman said it would study the possibility of a further appeal against the Court of First Instance ruling.
