The Hong Kong authorities do not have any plans to reuse the Tai Po housing estate, which was devastated in a deadly fire in November, for residential use, a senior official said on Saturday, pointing out that rebuilding on the same site is “not really very practical.”
"It is not possible to rebuild residential units after such an unfortunate event, even if you look into experiences in other countries," Deputy Financial Secretary Michael Wong Wai-lun said on a radio program.
He is heading a task force on providing emergency accommodation for the affected residents of the Wang Fuk Court. The Nov 26 catastrophic fire burned seven of the eight buildings of the housing estate, leaving at least 161 dead and displacing nearly 2,000 households.
Currently, more than 4,400 residents are living in temporary housing, such as hotels and transitional housing.
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Ruling out the possibility that anyone will make a fortune from the land in the future, Wong said on the radio program that it would be more appropriate to develop community facilities at the site. “The place can be used to build facilities that are needed by the nearby communities in Tai Po and New Territories East.”
Talking about the impracticality of redeveloping the estate, he said it would take longer compared to other relocation options.
The special administrative region government is surveying Wang Fuk Court residential property owners to assess their preliminary preferences concerning long-term resettlement, with the earliest possible option of being rehoused in the same neighborhood in 2029.
“If we rebuild at the location, that will take about nine to 10 years because we will first have to deal with property rights issues, and it will take a couple of years to resolve legal matters if cases in other countries and regions are taken as a guide,” broadcaster RTHK quoted Wong as saying.
Explaining the procedure, he said the site has to be cleared once the government takes back all the property rights, which would take three to four years. “Even if we carry out the planning work at the same time that we tear down these blocks ... it will still take at least nine years to complete the project, in which case residents will only be able to get their flats in 2035.”
The administration has distributed questionnaires to Wang Fuk Court homeowners to gauge their long-term rehousing preferences and aims to collect all responses by mid-to-late January for further analysis.
The questionnaire asks owners whether they would consider accepting a government buyout of their property rights for HK$6,000 ($769.7) per square foot for flats with an unpaid land premium, or HK$8,000 per sq ft for those with the premium paid. The amounts are in line with the Hong Kong Institute of Surveyors’ estimates of valuations based on recent market transactions.
Owners will also have the option to purchase a new flat in one of five Home Ownership Scheme projects, or in one Green Form Subsidised Home Ownership Scheme project, located outside Tai Po, as outlined in the document, or to buy a private housing unit instead.
“We hope to systematically and comprehensively collect Wang Fuk Court flat owners' opinions, further listening to and summarizing their preferences,” said a government spokesperson.
