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Fairview Park residents only withdrew  objections to  the government  building a road  through  their development because they believed a ban would be placed on large trucks using it,   a court heard yesterday.

Instead, when Kam Pok Road opened, the stretch of Fairview Park Boulevard  became a major route for container trucks moving freight between the Lok Ma Chau  border crossing and  container depots in the New Territories, the Court of First Instance was told.

The claims were made on the first day of a judicial review before Recorder Gerard McCoy  SC into the government's  decision in 2005 to allow  large trucks  to use the road.

Signs, which ban  trucks  longer than seven metres from using the road,  have   been installed  since the filing of the review application, but they are covered  and  have no effect.

The hearing was  brought forward from October following protests at Fairview Park after  the death in January of a 12-year-old boy who was  knocked off his bicycle and run over by a  truck.

Fairland Overseas Development, formerly known as Canadian Overseas Development, which owns part of the land used  by the road,  has complained that the trucks constitute  a safety hazard,  are  damaging the road and reducing people's  quality of life.

Fairland says  it has a contract with the government stating that objections to  Kam Pok Road would be dropped in exchange for a commitment to erect the signs.

The government argues  that even if such a contract exists, which   it denies,  there were no officers involved in the process who were authorised to make such a pledge.

Much of yesterday was taken up with argument over an application by Fairland to amend its pleaded case. It wanted to include a request, if successful in its  application,  that it be granted the land   used to complete Kam Pok Road.

Mr Recorder McCoy said  the amendment was identical  to one  discussed between the parties  last year before being abandoned.

For that  reason and because  a major road had been built upon it,  it would be impossible for the land to be returned in its original  state.

Mr Recorder McCoy therefore denied the application for the amendment and ordered the  review to continue. The hearing continues today.



Large trucks a safety hazard, court told