Hong Kong will need an extra 100 kilometres of roads and 54 kilometres of rail track as its population grows to 8.1 million by the end of the next decade.
Deputy Secretary for Housing Andrew Wells told a regional seminar on infrastructural development yesterday that matching infrastructural projects was necessary to support housing programmes. According to plans, railways would be built to serve Ma On Shan, Tseung Kwan O, and Tuen Mun, and roads would be built to support the future urban hubs of West Kowloon and Tsing Yi.
He also said more participation by the private sector could help boost quality. 'Competitive bidding ensures quality of service to the public and the viability of the project. For individual housing sites, we may entrust infrastructural construction to private developers. This includes site formation, drainage, sewerage works, and road works.' Secretary for Works Kwong Hon-sang also said reclaiming more seabed would be inevitable. 'The population growth means we have to constantly look for more space for housing and infrastructure. We have to create more land by reclamation and by cutting into hillsides.' Speaking at yesterday's opening of the Senior Official-level Meeting of the Third Ministers' Forum, Financial Secretary Donald Tsang Yam-kuen said: 'Economic growth and infrastructure development reinforce each other.
'[Infrastructure] projects will need to be developed in anticipation of longer-term demand to provide necessary support for sustained growth.' More than $230 billion will be pumped into building new roads, railways, and housing and port projects in the next five years.
The three-day event will close tomorrow after a visit to the new airport and Tung Chung, which will allow the 31 delegates from 14 countries to see Hong Kong's latest infrastructural projects for themselves.
