In tomorrow’s world, Hong Kong’s leader sees a massive HK$500 billion artificial island in middle of the sea, home to 1.1 million people
Chief Executive Carrie Lam presses ahead with controversial 1,700 hectare reclamation project near Lantau Island, and says considering the cost is ‘narrow-minded’
A controversial plan to build several artificial islands to ease Hong Kong’s chronic overcrowding could cost half a trillion dollars of taxpayers’ money, it was revealed on Wednesday.
The eye-watering amount, which is about half of the city’s financial reserves, was given by a government source after Chief Executive Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor included the plan in a reclamation project that was the cornerstone of her second policy address as Hong Kong leader.
Estimated to be 1,700 hectares (4,200 acres) in size, the islands, situated to the east of Lantau Island, would be large enough to house 1.1 million people.
Dubbed the “Lantau Tomorrow Vision” by Lam, her grand plan is to develop Hong Kong’s biggest island and its surrounding areas, creating Hong Kong’s third housing and business centre in the process – the first two being Central and Kowloon East.
The project, almost double the size of its original proposal, would be the city’s largest and most expensive to date, with a predicted cost of between HK$400 billion and HK$500 billion (US$64 billion).
“It is, in my view, quite narrow-minded to avoid doing a thing because it is expensive,” Lam said at a press conference after her address.