Letters

URA gives priority to developers' needs at expense of residents

I refer to the report ('TST towers skewer new height limits', August 23).

Irene Chan, of Midland Realty, spoke about the internal sales of HK$20,000 per square foot at New World Development's The Masterpiece. This used to be known as the Urban Renewal Authority's Hanoi Road Redevelopment. She said: 'This kind of luxury building is not targeting people on the street but loaded buyers, mostly from the mainland.' This comment certainly puts projects under the URA into perspective.

Critics of the URA have claimed all along that its purpose is to move small businesses and clear ordinary Hong Kong people out of their homes. It sends them to reside and eke out a living in far-off new towns in the New Territories and East Kowloon so that property developers can build expensive investment opportunities in our most desirable inner-city locations.

The URA website claims is redevelopment projects target 'old, dilapidated buildings with poor living conditions. These sites will be replanned and rebuilt to achieve clear environmental and social benefits such as open space and community facilities'.

It also talks about assembling 'larger areas of land for comprehensive planning'.

With regard to The Masterpiece, it is patently obvious that the only truth in this statement is the bit about assembling large areas of land for comprehensive planning, not for the benefit of Honk Kong people, but to provide more half-empty 'investment' towers like those on West Kowloon. The Masterpiece is a monolith blocking ventilation and views.