1 Architects complain about limited role in big projects
Patsy Moy, The Standard 7 April 2009

Architects are up in arms over not getting a bigger slice of the 10 mega infrastructure projects, accusing the government of shifting the balance to engineers.

Hong Kong Institute of Architects president Anna Kwong Sum-yee said she raised the issue with Secretary for Transport and Housing Eva Cheng Yu- wah last week, pointing out the government was favoring engineers in the projects.

In a recent job expo, the government highlighted 1,000 professional positions related to the 10 projects. Most were for engineers and surveyors.

Kwong said the government rarely involved architects in its projects.

"They are mostly dominated by engineers who focus on the technical and functional parts of the construction. But architects can have a role in improving the aesthetic aspects of the city, including building roads and bridges.

"Besides the technical and functional aspects, Hong Kong should also need to have better urban planning."

Institute council member Ivan Ho Man-yiu said infrastructure projects will provide an opportunity for Hong Kong to improve its streetscapes if architects play a "dominant" role in construction, which is common overseas.

The institute also appealed to district councils to start more construction programs and create demand for jobs.

"Neighborhood projects are relatively small in scale, but they provide a good training ground for the junior architects to ... gain more experience," Kwong said.

The institute is also urging the Architectural Services Department to provide more trainee posts for new graduates.

And it sent representatives to Beijing last week to contact various authorities, including the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development and the Ministry of Commerce in hopes of securing job opportunities for new graduates and junior architects.

Institute secretary Dominic Lam Kwong-ki said it was crucial to keep fresh graduates in architecture and to ensure they develop skills and experience or Hong Kong stands to lose the core of the profession.

"Graduates may go into other sectors if they do not find a job in architecture," Lam said. "They are unlikely to rejoin the sector after they have spent a few years in other professions."

Both the University of Hong Kong and the Chinese University turn out about 100 architecture graduates a year, while another 300 graduates from overseas sit for the qualifying exam every year.

Besides the push on the major projects, the institute has complained about the Buildings Department's recently imposed limit of six meters on "hanging gardens" at new buildings.

Kwong said the limit would interfere with designs and should be lifted.

 

2 'Bridge' structure used for centre's expansion
Joyce Ng, SCMP 7 April 2009

The extension of the Convention and Exhibition Centre under construction, for which a bridge-type structure was used to save reclamation.  Photo: TDC  Source: SCMP

The architect behind the expansion of the Convention and Exhibition Centre has revealed how a bridge-construction method was adopted to avoid reclamation.

The HK$1.4 billion project, which has expanded the atrium between phase one and phase two of the centre, has just been completed and will be used for an electronics fair next week. Architect Lam Wo-hei said the bridge method was adopted because the atrium spanned a 90-metre-wide water channel.

"We could not insert piles into the seabed as it would clash with a planned road, P2, and the Sha Tin-Central rail link, which will run through the channel bed," Mr Lam said, adding that harbour reclamation was strictly restricted since a court ruling in 2004.

He said supporting pillars could only be used on the channel banks but not the seabed. So instead of building the structure from bottom to top, an unconventional "top-down" approach was used.

This involved using five huge steel trusses - each weighing between 1,700 and 2,100 tonnes - that spanned the channel and which were strong enough to support pillars and other structures from the roof. The bridge approach raised the construction cost by about 10 per cent, he said.

A total of 28,000 tonnes of steel was used in the project, almost equivalent to that used in the commercial tower Two IFC.

Mr Lam said this method was seldom used in ordinary construction. A few exceptions included Charing Cross railway station in London and the AsiaWorld-Expo on Lantau, but they were of a smaller scale.

The project, funded by the Trade Development Council, adds 19,400 square metres of space to the atrium to house about 1,000 booths.

RTHK will launch a two-episode documentary series on the construction process and the conference industry on Thursday.