My Take | A practical development plan Hong Kong needs

If the Northern Metropolis proves a success, the government will need to rethink its vision for Lantau

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Aerial view of Kwu Tung area at North New Territories. At the backdrop is Shenzhen City. Photo: Winson Wong

Published: 9:00pm, 8 Oct 2021Updated: 1:30am, 20 Oct 2021

The Northern Metropolis is on, the Lantau Tomorrow Vision is out. That, at least, is how it looks to many observers since the new ambitious development plan was announced in Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor’s last policy address for this term.

This is despite her insistence that her baby, the massive HK$1 trillion land-reclamation project off east Lantau, is still in the works.

If the Northern Metropolis will meet all the targets for housing and urbanisation that Lam claims it will, then the staggeringly expansive Lantau project will not be necessary.

If not, then she is overselling the northern New Territories project. In that case, the public has a right to know how the two massive projects will work together in the future.

The logic behind the Northern Metropolis is clear; that behind east Lantau has always been much fuzzier, no pun intended. The former meets two immediate goals demanded by the central government: integration of the city into the rest of the Greater Bay Area, and resolving the city’s housing crisis, which Beijing, rightly or wrongly, has blamed for the social malcontent that led to the violent unrest of 2019.

The Lantau development is projected over two decades; the north New Territories project can be delivered in half that time. After all, it will only involve rezoning for urbanisation, and building infrastructure to connect it to the rest of the city and to Shenzhen, and no massive land reclamation.