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Peggy Sito

An ambitious multi-billion dollar project to redevelop a number of shipyards and sawmills on the waterfront of Yau Tong for residential use is set to get off the ground, with the possible involvement of the Mass Transit Railway Corp (MTRC).

  The MTRC is likely to step in on the long-delayed project and exercise its power under Hong Kong law to force acquisition of certain plots within a development site so long as a majority of the other land owners have already sold.

  This should clear the way for construction of a huge residential development at the future Yau Tong Station along the Tseung Kwan O MTR extension line, sources said.

  The corporation confirmed yesterday it was considering setting up a new depot and a new station in Yau Tong Bay in eastern Kowloon.

  Swire Properties managing director Keith Kerr also confirmed the MTRC's potential participation in the development but he said that no agreement had been signed.

  'It's moving,' said Mr Kerr, but he declined to predict when the project would be finalised.

  Some of the territory's biggest developers and owners of shipyards and sawmills in the area have plans to redevelop the existing properties in a residential project with a total floor area of more than six million square feet.

  The redevelopment should fetch about $30 billion once completed, based on today's market price of $5,000 per sq ft.

  Major developers such as Henderson Land Development, New World Development, Sun Hung Kai Properties, Hang Lung Development, Swire Properties and Wheelock and Co are already involved.

  The plan to redevelop the area was first floated in the late 1980s but it has been dragged down by a series of setbacks, the worst of which has been persuading the different land owners in the area to sell their properties.

  Sources said the participation of the MTRC would mean deadlocks in site assembly could be resolved because the corporation could exercise its power to acquire remaining land lots for its proposed station and depot development.

  Owners of remaining lots in the area had been reluctant to sell their properties and either refused to join the redevelopment programme or demanded very high compensation prices, sources said.

  The six big developers have already acquired 43 per cent of the necessary land ownership rights for the potential development site. In addition, major shipyard and sawmill owners, who hold 50 per cent of land in the area, are in favour of a joint development.

  Those land owners include China Merchants Group, Henry Fok Ying-tung's Yau Wing Company, Cheong Sun Group, E. Ting Realty, Wang Tak Group, Lucky Group and Chinachem Group.

  The total site area occupied by existing shipyards and sawmills is about 950,000 sq ft. With an estimated plot ratio of seven times expected for the area, the site could provide more than six million sq ft in floor area.

  The property development could be expanded further if a proposed land reclamation in Yau Tong Bay is incorporated into the project.

  Sources said the six developers intended to form a consortium and then team up with shipyard and sawmill owners to secure the MTRC's support to acquire the remaining properties.

  In return, the developers would provide space for the MTRC to build a new depot on the site.

  An MTRC spokesman said the plan to build the new depot aimed at serving the new Tseung Kwan O extension line had not yet been finalised.



Yau Tong gets MTRC push