A recent judgment in a long-running dispute over plans to develop a site in North Point may offer hope to Mei Foo residents fighting a proposed high-rise building near their homes.
The Court of First Instance in February threw out arguments by a company that said it could make use of unused development rights from Carson Mansion in King's Road to develop an adjacent lot that was originally part of the same site.
It said that if the entire development potential available to a site was not used, the unused part could not be said to 'remain' with one of the component lots.
Barrister-legislator Audrey Eu Yuet-mee said yesterday the same reasoning could be applied to the Mei Foo case, in which a company wants to develop a former LPG storage site next door.
Opponents of the plan are meeting lawyers to discuss the case this week after staging a protest at the private housing estate on Sunday.
In the Carson Mansion case, a triangular lot had been left vacant for years because it was earmarked for an MTR station, but the station plan was dropped and a company bought the unused lot. The company wanted to use 650 square feet in floor area of development potential not used on the Carson site due to previous government miscalculations.
In rejecting the claim, Mr Justice Anselmo Reyes cited a 1983 Privy Council case, saying the company would have to own the original Carson Mansion site or buy it to be able to claim use of its unused development potential.