Record rains in Hong Kong put spotlight on policy flaws, incentives for underground car parks
- Industry experts criticise basement car parks as vulnerable to flooding and fire, in addition to being expensive to maintain
- But others say moving away from above-ground car parks has revived street life and improved Hong Kong’s urban environment
Industry experts are calling on the government to review its current guidelines on car park construction, after Hong Kong’s heaviest rainstorm in over a century flooded underground facilities and wreaked widespread financial damage.
Basement car parks were particularly hard hit. In Chai Wan’s Wan Tsui Estate, one such facility was half-filled with water that left vehicles almost completely submerged. On social media, frustrated car owners shared stories of heavily damaged vehicles and lamented not buying full insurance coverages.
“The previous practice was promulgated in late 2000s under the sustainability guidelines formulated by a group of academia and government planners without practising experience,” said Barry Lee Chi-hong, president of Hong Kong Institution of Engineers. “It is time to review such guidelines and its impact on the industry and end products.”
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Why car park ownership is big business in Hong Kong
The world’s least affordable housing market is filled with densely packed skyscrapers, and parking bays are often built deep underground below residential buildings. A major reason is that government rules exempt private underground car parks from being counted as a building’s gross floor area (GFA).