Housing project on Yuen Long wetland gets the nod

One of the last remaining pieces of wetland in the northwestern New Territories will be swallowed up by development after the government's town planning advisers gave conditional approval for a housing project to developer Cheung Kong.

Approval for the site at Fung Lok Wai, near the Mai Po reserve, comes 20 years after the developer first applied for it, and has sparked fears that it could pave the way for other, much bigger wetland developments in future.

The approval is also hedged with numerous conditions that must be met before work can go ahead, prompting one opponent to liken it to awarding an examination pass provided the candidate corrects the answers later.

Under the proposal by Cheung Kong subsidiary Mutual Luck Investment, 5 per cent of the 80-hectare wetland in Yuen Long will be developed into 19 residential towers of nearly 2,000 flats while the rest will become a wetland reserve.

The approval - with 17 conditions - was given by the Town Planning Board after a meeting yesterday that had been described as the developer's last chance to prove its case.

Mutual Luck had sought and gained four deferrals since the original deadline in August, and the Planning Department, in an unusual move, sought a final one until yesterday.

Most of the conditions require the developer to submit supplementary documents on a wide range of issues including the master layout plan, habitat conservation plan and funding for the wetland reserve.